In March 2020, NYU transitioned its spring and summer courses online, halted or postponed in-person campus events and activities, and moved its workforce to telecommuting, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result of this drastic operational shift, the NYU Office of Alumni Relations’ Advancement and Alumni Communications team quickly sprung into action to develop a robust content strategy to keep NYU’s 600,000+ alumni informed, engaged, and digitally connected during this unprecedented period of remote work and learning.
From inspirational alumni stories about essential workers, to alumni-inspired recipe roundups, to messages of support to students from alumni, we pivoted and elevated our marketing, using original and meaningful online content that delivered impressive results. In addition to directly addressing the needs of our alumni community during a period of historic change, our team’s original COVID-19 content marketing efforts engaged new alumni and re-engaged those who had fallen distant. The new content generated 18,000+ new users on the NYU Alumni website (alumni.nyu.edu) and more than 30,000 new opens via email in the span of just two months. In response to unprecedented events, we crafted and executed a high-performing digital content strategy to meet the needs of alumni during historic and unprecedented times for the University.
