The Yearbook World of Scott Geesey
from Jostens Yearbooks of central/northern Pennsylvania
ARCHIVE - JANUARY 19, 2020
WHAT DOES 3X MEAN TO YOU? If You Want a Truly Great Yearbook, It Should Mean EVERYTHING!
Hello! Enjoy that weekend snowfall? NOW winter has arrived. And then the COLD. Winter showed up all at once. Now we have to wonder what the next two months will bring - it could be interesting...
These next few weeks are crucial for both spring yearbooks who need to stay on schedule and fall yearbooks who need to start submitting pages and stay on deadline. We can't blame any bad weather for delays. If needed please re-double your efforts to submit your pages on time to keep things on schedule.
Here's a reminder, the deadline for this year's Jostens Photo Contest is March 1. If you have some great photos from students, urge them to register online and submit their images online. Just go to www.jostensphotocontest.com for the rules and to enter. There are some GREAT prizes. And for both YearTech software and YearTech Online users, get ready for the annual page design contests which should open shortly.
Be sure to check out brand new updates of The Yearbooking Report in the right column. The feature interview this month is on good yearbook promotion - not just book sales but promoting your staff's hard work all year long through good storytelling. Definitely worth a watch and listen!
How many students are currently in your yearbook just once? Think those students will buy your book? Think 3X!
In my travels recently I've been busy checking on everything but especially on book sales.
But as we try some fun promotional ideas to hype your effort, is your book something that many students WANT to buy? There is the key issue. And this begins with asking a simple question...
HOW MANY TIMES ARE PEOPLE PICTURED?: In my years as a yearbook representative, I've seen many instances where a relative handful of people are pictured in the yearbook well over a dozen times each, while the great majority of the remaining students are only pictured once, in the portrait section. It's one of the dangers of a student yearbook staff.
The temptation of allowing students to completely run a yearbook operation is that they will go out and get pictures of themselves and their friends, and then more pictures of their friends, and then MORE pictures of just THEIR friends. I remember one book years ago where I saw the same handful of girls on virtually every page.
Now think about that - who would buy that book? That handful of girls certainly did, but why would anyone else? EXACTLY - they wouldn't. So the question must be asked - how many times are YOUR students currently pictured in your yearbook?
The idea is to "spread the wealth" and work hard to picture as many of your students in the book as possible. This makes the book infinitely more valuable for everyone, which means it's a more marketable book that represents the entire school. That should always be the goal.
HOW MANY TIMES SHOULD PEOPLE BE PICTURED?: Jostens advisers know about what I call the 3X Rule. The idea is to work hard to see that every person in school is pictured in the yearbook at least three times. That would be their portrait photo, plus perhaps a team or club image for which they belong, plus at least a third team or club or candid image of that student. That's 3X!
Why is that important? Imagine going to a student and saying, "You're in the yearbook once right now, your head shot." Will that student buy a yearbook? Probably not, because the yearbook staff didn't show much interest in that student. Why waste your money on something that doesn't picture me?
Now imagine going to that student and saying, "Hey, did you know you're in the yearbook four times right now, on pages 9, 34, 76 and 119?" That would get just about anyone's attention. It shows that the yearbook staff DID show an interest in me by getting me on four pages. Gee, how can I get the book?
This is a basic premise of good marketing - show the customer how the product benefits them and they'll be much more likely to buy.
HOW CAN I KEEP TRACK OF STUDENTS?: For Jostens advisers, both software and online users, this is an easy one, our revolutionary Coverage Report tools for both software and online users. Coverage Report makes it easy to track how many times each student is currently pictured.
But are you USING Coverage Report? I've been a bit disappointed to find that many yearbook staffs have completely ignored using this amazing tool. But the good news is that Coverage Report is a retroactive tool, meaning that even if you have submitted pages you can still keep track of student coverage.
For my Jostens advisers reading this week, I encourage you to start or continue using Coverage Report, and I bet you'll find that scenario I described above of a few students pictured a lot of times and many students pictured just once.
For any non-Jostens advisers reading this week, the Jostens Coverage Report tool is one of the many reasons why Jostens schools have technology advantages that other schools lack. But I hope you have some way to keep track of your student coverage, even if it's the old fashioned way of tracking students in a notebook. The information is so important to having balanced coverage in your book.
LET'S GET STARTED: It's never too late to start counting, even if you're a spring yearbook school, but the key is to start NOW while you still have time and pages left to complete. You can work on getting diverse images of different people who are only in your yearbook one time right now.
For fall yearbook schools it's also not too late and it's time to get started. You have a great opportunity to offer more well balanced coverage, making your book much more valuable while you are still in the active stage of your yearbook sale from now through the end of the school year.
And for Jostens schools, remember that picturing students ar least three times is a key component of winning the annual Yearbook Program of Excellence Award. The goal is at least 50% of the student body pictured at least three times - not a crazy goal, actually very attainable.
The 3X rule is crucial to the ultimate success of your yearbook effort, both in more coverage of everyone and in making your book much more valuable. That's a winning combination for every staff.