Choose Bigger – Wisconsin Marketing Campaign Finds Its Target

Choose Bigger – Wisconsin Marketing Campaign Finds Its Target

By Cairine Caughill

When the Wisconsin area wanted to increase the number of qualified applicants for apprenticeships, they decided to try something different. Ken Groeschel Jr., project manager at Butters-Fetting Company, Inc. and co-chair of the Milwaukee Apprentice Committee, along with Lauri Rollings, former executive director at the Plumbing Mechanical and Sheet Metal Contractors’ Alliance (PMSMCA), reached out to Nehlsen Communications, an agency that works primarily in the union/construction trade industry, for help creating a marketing campaign that would resonate with their target market.

“We hadn’t promoted the industry and its potential before,” Groeschel explains. “We wanted to improve our candidate pool in the apprenticeship ranks, go out and market our industry and the jobs to the schools and the guidance counselors we’d largely ignored for a long time.”

Matt Sanchez of Nehlsen Communications says, “We called the campaign Choose Bigger because we wanted to create a versatile message. Choose bigger. Choose a future with no college debt. Choose a career in technology. Choose a bigger career within the community. We presented a comprehensive campaign that would advertise this industry in the same words that make it attractive to a young person.”

That message is no college debt, technology use, community, and a sense of pride. I built that. Look what I’ve done.

“These are all things that young people love, and we just led with it,” Sanchez says. “We delivered it through digital advertising strategies, so we were able to deliver to exact age groupings, exact jurisdictional boundaries, and women, which is a huge goal in this industry.”

The multi-faceted marketing program rolled out in 2017, and included a website, banners, brochures, videos, Google advertising, an email follow-up campaign, career fair displays, and social media with information for students, parents, and counselors.

According to Michael Mooney, president and business manager of Local 18, most of the high schools and the guidance counselors were steering all the kids towards four-year colleges.

“We knew that today’s youth don’t really want to have a mailing or a handout, so we’ve put everything online. They can get it on their phones. That’s what they’re interested in,” Mooney says.

However, reaching students is not enough. When the program was introduced, most parents and high school guidance counselors were steering all students towards colleges and universities after high school. Thus, to be effective, the program had to get buy-in from those gatekeepers.

“We split the cost and had joint meetings to develop the Choose Bigger platform…We knew we had a fantastic joint apprenticeship training program to offer but that we were not attracting as many candidates as we needed.

“We worked with our area technical college and created a pathway that would allow anyone completing the apprenticeship program to also earn a four-year degree by taking some basic courses at night,” Mooney says. “They end up with a bachelor’s degree and no college debt.”

This kind of opportunity appeals to guidance counselors who are focused on directing students toward higher education. “It also appeals to parents who have a vested interest in helping their children obtain a college degree without large tuition payments and high student loans,” Mooney says.

The Wisconsin area is definitely finding success with the Choose Bigger program. “This platform has allowed us to market and brand our jobs so we could improve recruitment efforts and sell our industry to a competitive labor pool,” Groeschel says.

Indeed, Mooney credits the marketing campaign for driving apprenticeship enrollment numbers higher than ever. “It’s added another tool to our belt,” he says.

(Choose Bigger has done so well that the program has spread beyond Wisconsin to the Mid-Atlantic—West Virginia, Maryland, Virginia, and Washington, DC—and Colorado. All of the regions’ sites are available via choosebigger.com. Each site is customized with area-specific information, including wage rates.)

Both Groeschel and Mooney say the strong partnership between SMART and SMACNA in Wisconsin was instrumental in developing this program. “We split the cost and had joint meetings to develop the Choose Bigger platform,” Mooney says. “We knew we had a fantastic joint apprenticeship training program to offer but that we were not attracting as many candidates as we needed. Working together made sense because when we get the best candidates, the employers are getting the best employees, and the union is getting the best members. It’s a win-win.”

Jonathan Kowalski, the current executive director of PMSMCA, is excited about the program as it stands and about its potential.

“There’s a population decline going on in the Midwest,” he says. “That means more competition to attract 18 to 25-year-olds. We have good momentum now, so how do we refine? How do we continue to tweak the message? How do we continue to be smart about where we’re putting resources as we try to grow these apprenticeship programs?” ▪

Cairine Caughill is a freelance writer based in Toronto, Canada.

SPREADING THE WORD ABOUT CHOOSE BIGGER

Dylan Mooney is a first-year apprentice with Local 18 and has been working at Total Mechanical for just over a year.

He first heard about Choose Bigger from his father, Mike Mooney, president and business manager of Local 18. “In my senior year, I decided I didn’t want to go to college and school wasn’t for me,” Dylan Mooney says. “I was talking to my dad, and he said I could get into sheet metal and told me all the numbers—the wages and all that—and I was pretty intrigued.”

During high school, the trades weren’t really on Dylan’s radar. “I was never told how to get into the trades. I was told, ‘You’re going to go to college. What college do you want to go for?’ They made all of us send ACT applications to colleges I didn’t have interest in. They never really focused on the trades.”

Dylan is a great advertisement for the trades now. One of his friends is a pre-apprentice at JM Brennan, looking at getting his apprenticeship within the next couple of months. He has another friend who is going to have the same chat Dylan did with his dad.” Dylan also plans on persuading a couple more of his friends to get into the trade.

Dylan’s friends are always interested when he mentions his salary. “I tell them you work hard for the money, and they’re good to you,” he says. “You get paid to learn, and you get reimbursed if you get good grades, so there’s incentive to pay attention and go to school. They’re seeing that I have a solid job with a steady schedule and good pay. I tell them, ‘It could be you.’”