Facebook & University Career Centers:

Looking at the past to determine the future

Executive Summary
Those wishing to reach a university-aged audience has, for the most part, begun to use Facebook to
reach said audiences. University offices, including career services centers, must be able to communi-
cate with their students and are increasingly doing so using Facebook. Offices create a page not just to
disseminate vital information but also to create a two-way communication with the student body. Social
media tools like Facebook make this two-way communication possible.

This paper explores how five universities/colleges in the United States have used Facebook to connect
with their respective student bodies. The paper also offers conclusions and recommendations for the
St. Bonaventure University Career Center to take. Some of these important recommendations include

Posting plenty of photographs featuring real people,

Advertising upcoming events and being sure to invite students
Using the center‟s Facebook page as a career center newsletter
Creating discussions and hosting contests for “intern/employer of the month”

Table of Contents

Introduction 2

Method 2

Results 3
Canisius College 3
College of Saint Rose 3
Notre Dame College 4
Nazareth College of Rochester 4
Dominican University 5

Conclusions 6

Recommendations 6

Works Cited 6
 2

Introduction
Created in 2004 and now touting more than 400 million users, Facebook has evolved into an
important communication tool for numerous aspects of life (Facebook.com). It allows organizations
to have two-way communication with their fans and audience members. Facebook users can
share articles, opinions, photographs and everything in between with friends on the site. The tool
is especially popular among college students. However, more older audience members are joining
Facebook every day.

The purpose of this particular Facebook research project is to identify Facebook opportunities for
the St. Bonaventure University Career Center. Also, the researcher considered implementation
tactics and how they might be carried out in the near future.

Method
Overall, this is a benchmark research project of five university career services centers that have
Facebook. The researcher began to identify possible benchmarks using the list of centers that
participated in a 2009 NACE survey. Because St. Bonaventure is a private school, the researcher
eliminated state schools that receive more public funding. The researcher also eliminated any
schools that aren‟t similar to St. Bonaventure. For the remaining institutions, the researcher con-
ducted Facebook searches to see if each school had a Facebook fan page. Schools with only
Facebook groups were eliminated. From there, the researcher pared the list down by determining
which sites had the most participation and appeared most appealing from a student‟s point of view.

Finally, the researcher chose five schools to benchmark: Canisius College, College of Saint Rose,
Notre Dame College, Nazareth College of Rochester and Dominican University.

Once schools were determined, the researcher created a set of criteria by which to judge each
page. Criteria included: date created, number of followers, number of wall posts, number and type
of links posted, number of events posted, amount of user interaction, number of notes posted and
other.

Third and finally, the researcher contacted the university career centers to find out more
in-depth information into why they chose to do what they did. She received e-mail
responses from Dominican University and conducted a phone interview with Canisius College rep-
resentative.

Upon examining the data, the researcher offered conclusions and recommendations for the St.
Bonaventure University Career Center.
Results 3
Canisius College created its page in September 2009. The page is not advertised with a Facebook
button on the center‟s website.
Followers 192 (About .04% of student body)

Link sources: MSN, HotJobs, Yahoo! Finance, Posts 84

government websites and event websites Links 16
Events 3
On average, Canisius invites about 40 people to Comments 4
its events that are posted on Facebook.
Likes 6

Two of the three notes Canisius has posted are Notes 3

“Alumni Spotlights” and feature Q&A sessions Discussions 0
with successful Canisius alumni.
Photos 1 album (1 photo)
Notes from Interview with Justin Johnston, Favorite
0
graduate assistant Pages
Canisius‟s career center thought Facebook
might be a good opportunity to increase event attendance and office awareness. They realized it‟s
basically no-cost, low-risk. If it doesn‟t work they had absolutely nothing lost except a little bit of time
put into it.
To promote the site, the two graduate assistants invited all their friends. They also sent out e-mail
blasts to the entire university and they have continued to send out e-mails once in a while. They also
mention the page to students who come in for appointments.
To promote the page, the center tried to show up in others‟ Facebook walls as much as possible.
Example: “Justin has become a fan of the Canisius career center” comes up on Justin‟s wall for all
of his friends see.
They said it took an hour or less to set up the page and however much time they decide to take to
manage it.
When they haven‟t posted an event in a while, they will post an article from MSN or Yahoo, etc.
Justin advised against sending too many messages after the initial blast phase. When people feel
bombarded by messages, they‟ll just un-fan you. He also said fan counts will eventually come to a
plateau and that shouldn‟t be discouraging.
So far, Justin said it has brought marginal attendance increases to career center events. Not hugely

College of Saint Rose created its page in June 2009. Its page is linked on its website.

Article sources: Wet Feet, Gotta Mentor, St. Rose‟s website, Yahoo Finance, HotJobs, MSN,
YouTube, regional business journal sites and various blog sites

While the center has a significant number of events Followers 158 (About 3% of student body)
posted, no one has been invited or has said they‟re Posts 250-300+ posts
attending.
Links 293 (Many posts are links)
Most page comments were created by the center to
Events 59 (5 upcoming)
remind followers of an upcoming event.
Comments 7
The center has 45 favorite pages that are mostly
career-related publications and organizations as well Likes 4
as companies/organizations that may hire students. Notes 0
This is a good place for students to go when they
want more resources than on the page. Discussions 1 (No respondents)
Photos 2 albums (7 photos)
Favorite
45
Pages
Results 4
Notre Dame College created its career center Facebook page in September 2009. The center has a
Facebook button link on its webpage. Followers 32 (.01% of student body)
Article/link sources: experience.com, Posts 32
businessweek.com, jobchoicesonline.com, Links 17
YouTube, glassdoor.com and company
websites (i.e., KPMG) Events 22 (2 upcoming)
Comments 0
No one has been invited or RSVPed for events.
Likes 0
NDC has separated tabs by category: Info, Notes 11
Photos, Discussions, Events, Notes (interns &
Employers), Photos and Discussions. Discussions 1 (Only Career Center responded)

The discussion board allows students to post Photos 5 albums (60 photos)
their internship experiences, but, unfortunately, Favorite
only one student has done so. 2
Pages
NDC‟s notes feature an intern and employer of the month and monthly tips and questions.

The center‟s favorite pages are related to other offices at NDC.

NDC does not have a LinkedIn group or a Twitter account. The center‟s director said it‟s more
important for the center to show/teach students how to use these other social media tools than to
use these tools themselves.

Nazareth College of Rochester created its page in August 2009 and has a link to the page on the
center‟s website.
Followers 124 (About .04% of student body)
Rather than posting links, Nazareth posts Posts 75
notes that contain links. They also post a
career funny of the week in the notes section. Links 0
Events 21
Although events are open, no one has been
invited nor has anyone RSVPed for any of the Comments 1
upcoming events. Likes 2

Someone has posted links about Rochester Notes 20

Youth Year a few times. Discussions 0

Most of the center‟s favorite pages are other Photos 1 album (2 pictures)
Nazareth College organizations and schools. Favorite
11
Pages
They have a tab to NazLink, their version of
College Central.
Results 5
Dominican University created its career center page in 2009, although it created a Facebook group
in late 2008. The site is linked on the center‟s website and the office‟s assistant director said that‟s one
way they spread the word about the Facebook page.

Link sources: Twitter, wsj.com, kaptest.com, Chicago Tribune site, Monster and events.

In addition to typical posts, like links and Followers 278 (About 7% of student body)
photos, DU‟s career center posts general Posts 107+
updates, like “Good luck with classes!” at the
beginning of the year. Links 7

A decent amount of comments and likes Events 22

from repeat users. DU actually has 5 unique
Comments 10
users (mostly recent alumni) who have
posted comments and 12 unique users Likes 23
(primarily students, some recent alumni) who
have “liked” something on the page. Notes 0

DU‟s career center has posted a lot of Discussions 20 (Few responses)

photos on its Facebook site. It has 5 albums Photos 5 albums (About 135 pictures)
containing about 135 pictures. Albums are:
„08/‟09 events, staff, fall ‟09 semester, Favorite
around the office and spring 2010 semester. 0
Pages

E-mail interview notes, Jose Garcia, assistant director, career advising, Dominican University
Goal upon joining was “to be visible on Facebook so current students and alums would be able to
find out information about our office though this channel, and not have to go to our homepage to
learn about events, programs, etc.”

They have received mostly positive feedback from students who enjoy event reminders and seeing
pictures from the events.

To promote the page, the center sent an e-mail blast to all students, added a Facebook link on the
center‟s homepage and used word of mouth at various events, particularly during summer
orientation meetings with new students.

Two people manage most of the page‟s content, which takes less than two hours per week to do.

DU uses Twitter (www.twitter.com/ducareers) to communicate mostly with employers mostly be-

cause they advertise employment opportunities there. They also participate in the alumni office‟s
LinkedIn page, which is very active.

“We know lots of good networking can be done on these social sites, so we keep up with the
students and what they‟re using!” Jose Garcia, of the Dominican University Career Center.
 6
Conclusions
Maintaining a Facebook page takes little time, little effort and no cost.
Facebook offers a small analytical service that allows businesses/organizations to monitor how often
people are joining and viewing the page.
Balance is important! Too much of one this isn‟t good; people will become desensitized or will leave.
However, not enough of something isn‟t good either because then it will be forgotten.
Through one method or another, all of these organizations used Facebook to distribute links
containing helpful career information.
A somewhat small percentage of students seem to have “friended” their college‟s career center.,
perhaps because it‟s still a relatively new concept and students are not fully comfortable with it.
Photos are vital and definitely help to liven up a page. Photos should contain people, particularly
students at the university.
None of the career centers studied here had a ton of student engagement.

Recommendations
Facebook has two main purposes: to share information and to engage or network with others. It‟s
important for organizations to not only share information but share conversation — Facebook is a
two-way street.

Discussions seem to be somewhat unsuccessful, so it may be better to bypass that feature and
instead create discussions with students right on the center‟s wall.

Use plenty of photographs and create a staff photo album. This gives the career center a face for
those who have never physically visited the Career Center. Also, showing photos of students at
events may help encourage students to participate in future events.

Promote the page heavily upon launch with e-mails and word of mouth. Find any professors who
have a Facebook account and ask them to mention our page to their classes.

Place a Facebook button on the Career Center‟s website.

The SBU Career Center‟s favorite pages could be viewed as a resource for students looking for
more in-depth, outside information. The favorite pages also allow for more career center integration
with the university.

Notre Dame College had a good idea with the intern stories discussion. However, only one person
has participated. Perhaps to entice students to participate and post their intern stories‟ photos, the
Career Center could offer a small prize to the best one.

The Facebook page could potentially become the student tips newsletter to replace Directions.
Articles, tips, events, etc. would be posted on the page multiple times per week and then perhaps
every month the Career Center could create a small PDF/html document to distribute via e-mail as a
sort of This month in Facebook round-up.

Use analytics to adjust the page or to know what works.

Works Cited
http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics#!/press/info.php?timeline

Research conducted and paper created by Ruth Harper

St. Bonaventure University Career Center, Spring 2010