Melbourne-based digital marketing agency Social Garden has announced two major wins, securing a new government client, Study Melbourne, the Victorian Government’s international education marketing brand, while also announcing its further expansion into New Zealand with an appointment to the federal government’s panel of preferred marketing agencies.
Pictured, from left to right: Andrew McLaughlin, Rosie Brown, Margot Tanjutco, Ben Bonnici and George Glover.
Social Garden will deliver a full-service offering for Study Melbourne across social media management, content creation, social listening and user-generated content – the latter has given Social Garden a strong point of difference through its education marketing agency Student Garden, which supports universities, TAFEs, schools and RTOs acquire leads, applications and enrolments and uses students to create genuine user-generated content and marketing collateral.
The agency’s expertise in working across the education sector gives it a strong understanding of what students respond to, with all content vetted by students to ensure campaigns are resonating with its desired audience.
Meanwhile across the Tasman, Social Garden’s continued work across New Zealand has culminated in the agency’s appointment to the government’s panel of marketing and advertising companies, permitting each to work with more than 300+ government bodies, which extends to universities, polytechnics and councils, as well as other regular departments including tourism.
Social Garden’s work on the New Zealand contract is primarily advertising and design services, the likes of which have driven successes like a 64 percent uptick in applications year-on-year for Australian National University’s Crawford School of Public Policy, a 42.86 percent increase in applications for Southern Cross University, and a 31.92 percent increase in student registrations year-on-year at Builders Academy Australia.
Social Garden’s founders, Michael Bird and George Glover, both hail from New Zealand; the pair has an office operating in Auckland, and has previously worked with the likes of the University of Wellington on its marketing automation and implementation.
“We see New Zealand as a really important next step for us, and we’re excited to expand more into our home country – we are seeking to bring on at least six new NZ clients this year, primarily across content creation, advertising and marketing automation,” George said.
“We created Student Garden as a way of providing universities and TAFEs with access to student content, targeted specifically at the prospective students who will one day attend their campuses – we have seen some incredible results in Australia, and we are looking forward to replicating those in New Zealand.
“More and more government bodies and companies are realising the power of organic user-generated content in advertising – social media marketing is constantly changing, and we’re finding that an increasing number of users really resonate with user-generated content, as opposed to other content which can be over-curated and highly edited.”
Social Garden began work with Study Melbourne in late-2021, and will be using its appointment to the
New Zealand government’s panel as a springboard for further growth and expansion across the country.
