Times are subject to change by AMA. Please continue checking back for more sessions and descriptions!

Senior Leader Experience

Invite Only

The Senior Leader Experience is an intentionally programmed time where top campus marketers can share challenges, exchange ideas and make connections to build a lasting support system. Be the leader who values growth, best practices, boosts morale and inspires a high-performing marketing team! Learn more.

Advanced Email Strategy and Writing

Email is a secret weapon. It connects people on a personal level–if you can cut through the noise. This workshop covers advanced email writing strategies, how to craft emails people will read, and the tools you need to measure success.
People still read emails, but not the way you think. Practice five tested writing techniques that leverage how people read email. Create better emails with a trusted from name, a clear subject line, simple language, and action-driven links and buttons. You’ll see email designs formatted for scannability, ensuring messages are received and links are clicked. No fancy technology required!

Pre-Registration Required: Choose two of the six available workshops. Your selection occurs on-site. Learn more.

Future-Proof Your Marketing: A Hands-On AI Workshop

The Future of Discoverability: SEO, AI, and More

Higher education institutions put out a LOT of content. In this age of AI-generated content and social and AI search, it’s not enough to only do search engine optimization. This workshop will dive into different ways and places to be found, how to optimize your content for those channels, SEO, SGE (Search Generative Experience), and AEO (Answer Engine Optimization), and leveraging AI to optimize your workflow to ensure you can create epic content for all those places.
We will be running audits and reports using your content and doing live optimization that will create measurable results.

Pre-Registration Required: Choose two of the six available workshops. Your selection occurs on-site. Learn more.

Roadmap to Leadership

Join Melissa Richards and Carrie Phillips for an enriching workshop designed to guide emerging leaders through a structured roadmap to leadership excellence.

This interactive session will delve into personal leadership styles, key competencies such as financial acumen and data-driven decision-making, and strategic planning for the critical first 90 days in a new role. Through a blend of assessments, case studies, and a mentorship panel, participants will leave equipped with actionable strategies and insights. Prepare to engage, reflect, and develop a personalized leadership plan to navigate your journey to the top with confidence and skill.

Pre-Registration Required: Choose two of the six available workshops. Your selection occurs on-site. Learn more.

Welcome Reception

Yoga

Breakfast

Welcome + Keynote

The How-Tos and Whys of Reporting Marketing and Communications Results to Leadership

Earn the support for your team’s initiatives from your Board, President, and manager by sharing with them the results of your efforts. This session will provide you with tactics to demonstrate the ROI of your efforts, which fosters leadership’s trust and collaboration, as well as helps secure budgetary resources. Presenters from Babson College will share how they gathered, analyzed, and reported their results. They will talk about what to report and how to report to demonstrate measurable impact of their marketing efforts.

Game Changer: Unlocking the Brand Potential of Athletics in University Marketing

Athletics can have a big impact on a university’s brand, regardless of the institution’s size or division. In this session, we explore the intricate relationship between athletics and university marketing, revealing strategies to align both for mutual benefit. The secret boils down to strategy, deep partnerships, and a shared recognition that athletics is a “tide that raises all boats.” Attendees will gain insights from DI and DII institutions leveraging sports to boost brand visibility, leaving with pro-tips on everything from aligning logos to fully leveraging the potential of athletics to build audience affinity and brand recognition.

Truth in Advertising: Unfiltered answers to pressing questions.

Your chance to hear the whole truth and nothing but the truth about advertising. We all get CTRs and KPIs, but there’s a lot under the advertising hood that can be opaque. Black box algorithms. Conversion attribution. Trading. This session will quickly highlight the current landscape of higher ed advertising, then open into an ask-anything, panel-style Q&A. You’ll get the opportunity to have an open and honest discussion about all things advertising and pick the brains of an associate vice president for enrollment and admission services, branding agency, and digital media agency trio. The harder the questions, the better.

Nostalgia Meets Innovation: Creative Marketing for Fundraising Success

Discover the successful strategies behind Jackson State University’s annual Day of Giving, which has significantly increased participation and funds raised since its inception in 2015. This session will explore how JSU used creative, nostalgia-driven marketing techniques to engage a broad spectrum of alumni and supporters, effectively boosting both engagement and fundraising outcomes. Participants will learn practical tips on utilizing emotional connections and interactive elements in campaigns, ensuring an innovative approach to university fundraising.

From Good to Great: Unpacking Four Pillars of Higher Education Marketing with Industry Peer Experts

Join this session as Advance 360 Education hosts a dynamic panel discussion featuring marketing executives from two leading higher education institutions. We will delve into the essential components of higher education enrollment marketing through our exploration of four pillars that shape success in attracting and retaining students, such as:

• Ensuring a Solid Foundation: a well-defined brand, setting strategic goals supported by data and technology infrastructure.
• Developing and Segmenting Audiences: quantitative and qualitative intelligence analysis and the importance of your CRM in developing and segmenting audiences.
• Engaging and Nurturing Relationships: recognizing the entire student journey, aligning strategies with audience segments, earned and paid media.
• Continual Analysis and Optimization: a culture of data-focused decision making, measuring success, optimizing toward conversion.

Gain valuable insights, actionable strategies, and expert guidance to navigate the ever-evolving educational landscape and unlock your institution’s full enrollment potential. Don’t miss this opportunity to learn from industry expert peers and elevate your enrollment marketing efforts to reach your goals.

Sponsored by: Advance 360

What If You Could Build It From Scratch?

Rebuilding itself from the ground up, San Francisco Bay University’s president and acting CMO share insights on the transformative process of creating a challenger brand from scratch. This session showcases how design thinking and strategic positioning of marketing and communications inform decision-making in building a strong and disruptive brand. Learn actionable insights from our journey to forge a new MarComm unit, and leave with strategies to elevate your own department. Ideal for those looking to inspire change and foster innovation within their own organization. Blank slate optional.

Say "Hello" to Campus-wide Student Engagement Marketing

Florida State University’s “Hello FSU!” campaign has fueled the campus experience and sparked increased student engagement through this multi-channel marketing and communications movement. Learn how MarComm creatives teamed up with departments across the university to unify branding and messaging to engage students. Session participants will explore tools to create easily shareable branded content while saying hello to automated AI-infused messaging. Gather fresh ideas to promote consistent messaging, grow brand recognition, and learn tips to launch a social media ambassador program that focuses on increasing awareness of important student resources to further aid student retention and success.

Vision to Visibility: Transforming Strategic Plans into Campaigns

Strategic plans and university visions often do not make it past the eyes of the cabinet, trustees, and a minority of faculty and staff that helped to craft the plan. This begs the question – if these plans represent our most ambitious goals and future plans, why would we not share them with the world? Instead of reserving these plans to track internal progress, what if we turned them into compelling platforms that would unify messaging strategies and create the foundation for brand, enrollment, fundraising, and reputational campaigns? Michigan and Baylor are doing just that.

The Messenger Matters

Struggling to come up with impactful content and communications that consistently get and keep the attention of Gen Z? Who’s telling your college’s story? The messenger matters! Prospective students want emails and texts from real people, and they crave more content from the current student point of view because it helps develop connections. This session will explain how to make your enrollment communications feel more personal, engaging, and student-centered. We’ll also share how colleges have successfully utilized current students in strategic planning, social media campaigns, events, blogs, podcasts, and influencer marketing… all in the name of increasing enrollment.

Leveraging Market Research to Inform Institutional Strategy

Social, economic, and political headwinds are challenging the resilience of institutional brands and stymying higher education leaders’ ability to plan for an uncertain future. This session will examine Scripps’ use of time series data to inform institutional alignment, growth, and fiscal sustainability. Learn how senior leaders are utilizing data obtained through best practices in market research—quantitative studies, interviews, and assessments—to guide silo-busting conversations about the College’s strategic direction. The session will equip attendees to amplify their institutional brands by advocating successfully for the value of continuous research and leveraging multi-year data to drive institutional strategy.

Navigating Demographic and Market Shifts: Strategies for Gen Alpha and Multi-Generational Engagement

Preparing for Gen Alpha: Insights and Strategies for University Marketers | Ologie
The oldest Gen Alphas will be sophomores next year. They’ll be in your prospect pools before you know it. What do you need to know about this generation and how they might approach their college search? What’s going to be the most important thing in attracting and enrolling this generation? We asked 1,000 parents to find out.

Some findings are not surprising: STEM subjects continue to dominate preferences, the cost of college remains a daunting concern, and Gen Alpha’s intrinsic digital sophistication is a given.

Yet, it’s their pronounced role in family decision-making, the parental belief in the enduring value of higher education, and concerns about social and ideological belonging that offer new avenues for engagement. When it comes to understanding the parent relationship, we found that parents of Gen Alpha give their children a lot of agency in their own upbringing. They give their children a voice and a vote in personal and family decisions. The parenting relationship is closer to a partnership than a dictatorship. And as a result, they are emotionally closer than previous generations have been. What does this mean for higher ed marketers?

Adapting to Demographic Shifts: Leveraging Social Intelligence for Market Expansion Strategy | Campus Sonar
Higher ed is in the midst of demographic shifts, prompting a critical need for campuses to develop a market expansion strategy and engage prospective students outside of their current target markets. Market expansion is about knowing and understanding people’s motivations, a perfect opportunity for social intelligence.

Campus Sonar partnered with a small, niche college that wanted to strengthen market expansion efforts, use insights to inform and support innovative enrollment strategies, and develop an audience-aligned program marketing and recruitment strategy to drive top-of-funnel action.

Engaging a Multi-Generational Household Through Digital Marketing | Encoura
In addition to knowing where to engage your Gen Z and Gen Alpha prospective students, it’s equally important to know how to reach their most influential decision-making partners, their families. In fact, campaigns that include families have 4x the engagement when compared to campaigns that reach students alone. Stop by our Innovation Showcase to learn more about—and see examples of—digital tactics to reach and engage multiple generations in a home.

Lunch + Networking

OOO-no! Creative Solutions for the Chronically Understaffed

Recruiting and retaining talent is a pressing challenge across higher education, and marketing leaders carry the burden of trying to align staffing with institutional expectations of marketing. While our offices may be understaffed, demand for strategic and effective marketing and communications continues to increase at institutions of all sizes. This necessitates agile thinking, an openness to flexible working arrangements, and a lot of patience. Learn how three marketing leaders at three very different institutions have creatively addressed staffing gaps to build stronger, more diverse and more nimble teams and hear about trends from across the sector from the session moderator.

Beyond Words: Elevate voices through DEI campaigns

Words matter, but action matters more. Have you ever started to create a DEI communication program to meet the needs of your diverse audiences and then stopped dead in your tracks with fear of saying or doing the wrong thing? It can be the most paralyzing barrier to launching an effective inclusive communications initiative on your campus. Learn the three Cs that helped Towson University (TU) overcome fear and drive straight to action: connect, collaborate, communicate… repeat. In this session, we will unpack how TU went from no action to inclusive excellence.

Six Key Steps to Building An Effective MarCom Strategic Framework

Michigan State University’s communications and marketing department developed and implemented a repeatable strategic framework process that is documented in a compact visual format. We share tips and tools to connect to organizational business outcomes, support your university strategic plan and demonstrate value to leadership.

This process has driven alignment and prioritization and shifted our team from a channel- and tactic-centric organization to one more focused on audiences and outcomes. Most important, we aligned our contribution toward organizational business goals. For example, we contributed toward an 11% YOY increase in admissions applications. This strategic framework is a must for MarCom teams.

To Affinity—and Beyond! Ongoing Research & Brand Strength

For many institutions, brand research is a one-and-done exercise that only gets readdressed after staff turnover or a major institutional change. But, while initial research-informed branding is good, ongoing research-strengthened branding is better!
In this session we will make the case for a cadence of brand research. We will share how Duquesne University’s new data excited the campus about the brand equity they helped build, based on research four years prior, and inspired them to protect and grow this core business asset. We’ll also discuss how to intentionally plan for (and fund!) additional waves of research.

Navigating Strategic Shifts: Elevating Advancement MarComm at Drexel

Explore the evolution of advancement marketing and communications at Drexel University, set against a backdrop of significant institutional changes—including an $800 million+ fundraising campaign, the launch of a new strategic plan, an institutional merger, and organizational restructuring. This session will delve into the intricate challenges faced and strategies implemented to enhance communication efficacy, deepen relationships with stakeholders, and boost constituent engagement. Discover how strategic alignment with university goals and actionable approaches can transform advancement into a pivotal, value-adding partner in driving success during transformative periods.

How TCU Leads in Addressing Enrollment Challenges with Enhanced Site Search

Discover how Texas Christian University (TCU) is tackling the enrollment challenge head-on by optimizing their site search capabilities. This presentation will explore TCU’s innovative approach to improving the user experience for prospective students, making it easier to find relevant information, programs, and resources. Learn how enhanced site search plays a critical role in attracting and retaining students in a competitive landscape, and gain insights into the key website metrics that matter and best practices that can be applied at your institution.

Sponsored by: SearchStax

Exhibit Hall Break

Which comes first: rebranding, fundraising campaign, or both?

In an ideal world, branding comes first, and campaigns second. But in higher ed, a fundraising campaign will sometimes reveal a need to update your university’s brand. What you do next makes all the difference. Join our insightful panel of leaders from American University and Sullivan as they share how university marketing, advancement, and communications came together to create a successful new comprehensive campaign and a powerful new brand—all at the same time. Learn tips to help you tear down silos and work across teams, create efficiencies, and build the most effective advancement strategy for your institution.

Social Media Has Grown Up, Have You?

Redefining higher education’s approach to social media, this session transitions from traditional metrics to robust community engagement. It demonstrates practical applications for aligning social media with institutional goals, driving change through strategic content, and fostering meaningful interactions to enhance student and alumni experiences. Attendees will learn how to utilize social media to address critical conversations, inspire leadership, and actively engage their communities, ultimately elevating social media to a strategic leadership tool and shaking up the higher education marketing industry.

Navigating the Scrutiny: Utah’s Collective Approach to Redefining the Value of Higher Ed

Amidst nationwide scrutiny of higher education’s value, Utah’s Board of Higher Education launched a transformative communication campaign. This initiative leverages the collective strength of all 16 public institutions within the Utah System of Higher Education (USHE) to educate stakeholders about the benefits of pursuing higher education. A strike team of communication professionals from across the state have crafted an inspiring messaging platform emphasizing affordability, individual ROI, and economic impact. This presentation shares insights into the campaign’s strategy and aims to inspire similar collective efforts nationwide, reshaping perceptions of higher education’s value.

Mastering the Art of the Brand Shoot

In our visually driven market, great photos and videos are the key to creating an emotional connection with your audience. Our workshop will equip you with the knowledge and skills to execute a successful photo or video shoot tailored to your school’s goals and unique identity — regardless of budget constraints.
You’ll learn how to confidently plan a shoot in seven easy steps. It starts with understanding your brand’s visual identity and covers concept development, location scouting, working with student models, styling and using props, and even applying tools like AI. You’ll also receive some of the best tried-and-true templates.

From Creation to Action: Leveraging Active Brand Management for Enrollment and Marketing Synergy

Breaking Down Silos: Uniting Enrollment and Marketing for Higher Ed Success | GMB

Join GMB at the AMA Higher Ed Symposium for an insightful session on fostering collaboration between enrollment and marketing teams. Discover the pitfalls of departmental silos and learn how to build a cohesive strategy that drives both brand recognition and enrollment growth. Hear from a former higher ed CMO who has successfully navigated these challenges and gain practical insights on achieving partnership and synergy within your institution. Don’t miss this opportunity to enhance your institution’s impact by aligning your teams towards common goals.

The Intersection of Brand and Revenue: The Kurt Vonnegut Effect | Zillion

Is it better for a brand to be or to do? Defining a brand through its identity or through its actions? While this isn’t a black-and-white question, the answer just may be. Because one of these options has the potential to generate affinity across wider audiences, which, in turn, drives improved results and greater revenue. In a challenging environment for higher education, having an active brand is a decided advantage.

Why Brands Matter | NextGrad

This presentation will address branding, positioning, messaging, and the power of storytelling in higher education marketing. Rafkin will cover a wide range of branding best practices and discuss how research-driven storytelling can connect with students and stakeholders. Rafkin will reinforce these learnings with a case study of work he completed for the University of Maryland Eastern Shore, a Top-20 HBCU, by listening to the concerns of stakeholders, unifying a fragmented campus, increasing engagement with faculty and staff, and raising awareness of the university’s distinct heritage and elite HBCU status. By the end of the panel, attendees will understand why brands matter in the development of successful positioning, branding, and communication strategies for higher education institutions.

Keynote

Yoga

Breakfast

Keynote

Using Data to Compete for Online Students

The competition for online programs has never been greater. To rise above, you need to identify prospects who will apply, enroll, start, and succeed. Discover how Abilene Christian University Online COO Steven Rutt uses data science to consistently increase enrollments to the university’s online division. Partnering with his digital marketing agency CloudControlMedia, Steven has developed data-driven prospect marketing that drives enrollments. Leveraging data insights and scoring media sources based on down funnel attribution, ACU optimizes its digital media investment to identify the leads most likely to turn into students.

Reframing DEI: Building Bridges Despite Division

Diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs have become flashpoints on campuses around the country: championed by some, derided by others. Efforts to “rebrand” DEI offices as “community engagement” or “access and belonging” have had mixed success at best.
This session explores whether we need to “reframe” DEI given the country’s current political division and examines what solutions have worked amid heated political, community and institutional conversations.
Attendees will take part in an engaging and candid discussion among higher ed marketing and DEI leaders about how to navigate today’s confusing, inconsistent landscape and … how to work together moving forward.

Unbundled and Unconventional: Brand Development Without (Upfront) Buy-in or Budgets

When budgets are tight and short-term performance improvements are nonnegotiable, a traditional brand development process doesn’t always cut it. In this session, Kin Sejpal and Seth Odell share their journey in navigating the challenges of limited resources and urgent performance demands to create an engaging brand campaign while simultaneously decreasing costs. Using an unconventional, unbundled approach and leveraging existing research and paid media results, they succeeded in driving performance and garnering unwavering support for and a renewed focus on brand enhancement initiatives.

Rethinking Marketing in America: Unpacking Multicultural Nuances

Today I learned (TIL): Reddit advertising

Meet our new best friend: Reddit. It calls us back. It costs less. It offers better results! In 2022, we started experimenting and loved it. Now, this two-person ad team from a small undergraduate college has moved the bulk of its paid social advertising budget to the weirdest platform on the web. The result? Lower costs per mille, (way) better click-through rates, and a whole lot less stress (looking at you, Meta).
We’ll cover:
Who is on Reddit (Redditors)Content for Reddit’s culture (Reddiquette)Maximizing ROI (r/thatshowthingswork)
Rated PG-13 (it is Reddit after all)

Hits Different(iated): Crafting Higher Ed Marketing that Stands Out

Differentiation is top-of-mind for most colleges and universities at this moment of increased competition and change. When we fail to stand out in our brand and marketing campaigns, we lose students to competitors. When our creative and content look like everyone else’s, we devalue our institutions. And when our messaging is too salesy and transactional, we lose prospects’ trust and interest.

Gen-Z and Gen-Alpha are looking for authentic connection, values alignment, and a unique fit. In this presentation, Dr. Suzan Brinker, co-founder and CEO of Viv Higher Education, and her team will present a 4-prong approach consisting of 1) brand anthropology, 2) competitor analysis, 3) student demand analysis, and 4) labor market demand analysis. Following this approach unlocks roadmaps for differentiated full-funnel campaigns — uncovering opportunities for distinct messaging, targeting, and channel strategies.

Sponsored by: Viv Higher Education

Assessing Attitude in Academia with Analytical AI

This cutting-edge session explores how artificial intelligence (AI) is revolutionizing market research and engagement across internal and external stakeholder groups in higher education. Attendees will learn to leverage AI-powered tools to gain deeper insights into key audience members’ preferences and behaviors, optimize enrollment management and academic offerings, and pinpoint brand positioning.

Reverse Engineering a Brand: An Unconventional Process for an Unconventional Place

Carnegie Mellon University thrives on a form of disruptive innovation that traces its roots to founder Andrew Carnegie. However, a highly decentralized institution with so much intellectual diversity can be a difficult landscape for branding and marketing. In recent years it has struggled to define its brand essence in this often contrarian environment. Learn how a single TV spot was ironically the best place to start when crafting a unifying brand strategy. The presenters will share how this process worked backward to thoughtfully reengineer what is becoming Carnegie Mellon’s new brand platform: Where What If Becomes What’s Next.

Humble Pie: Two-Year Institutions Are Doing It Better

The challenges facing higher ed marketers are unprecedented, right? Wrong. Dwindling budgets. Under-resourced teams. Changing student populations. A value proposition that’s suddenly suspect. The truth is, four-year institutions are getting just a taste of the challenges two-year schools have been grappling with for decades. Another hard truth: many of the two-years are better at this. Join VisionPoint Marketing and some of the best community college marketers in the business as we share best practices and practical tips four-year, online, and graduate program marketers can employ to win, even in the face of 2024’s unique headwinds.

Incorporating Influencer Marketing Into Your Media Strategy

Colleges, universities, and educational organizations have a world of opportunity leveraging their advocates and turning them into micro-influencers. In this panel, hear how a public university system, a small private college and other educational organizations and corporations have used influencer marketing to infuse authenticity into their brand, build awareness and reach, and recruit students of all kinds.

Influencing Factors: The Strategies and Socio-Politcal Dynamics That Help Shape Student Enrollment

Engaging the Academic Journey: Successful Marketing Strategies Across the Student Lifecycle | Emma by Margold
In this session, we’ll take a look at some of the successful marketing strategies that have helped universities engage their target audience. With an emphasis on brand management and compelling storytelling, learn best practices for marketing for the entire student lifecycle from enrollment to alumni.

The State of the American College Student | Fuseideas
Justin Vogt, Senior Vice President/Head of Client Services of Fuseideas will present the findings from a perennial national survey of prospective and current college students. This research shares critical trends built upon benchmarks established in 2021, providing insights on students’ personal motivations for choosing an institution, as well as identifying key emotional and behavioral factors impacting students today.

How Politics Influences Where Students Enroll | Echo Delta
We’ll explore the results of a new nationwide study looking at how our current political climate influences where high school students plan to enroll. We’ll reveal the specific ways students believe politics could impact their college experience, how they balance political concerns against other factors like cost and reputation, the extent to which their parents’ political views influence their choices, the states that concern students most, and much more. As a bonus, attendees will receive a hard copy of our research report.

Lunch + Networking

How to be a Great Client (and Why That Matters)

How can you ensure your institution gets the best investment and output from your agency partners? How do you inspire your agency’s best work?

The stakes are higher than ever in education. Institutions must invest strategically, function with aligned leadership teams, and get the very best out of their agency and other external partners to ensure their organization’s success in this new era.

During this session, a panel of agency leaders moderated by a current higher education CMO will host a candid and constructive conversation on what makes for successful collaborations and how to maximize your agency partnerships.

Admissions Marketing Reimagined

Facing declining applications or worried about the enrollment cliff? You’re not alone. In 2019, Bucknell University was in the same boat — but today, we’re seeing record application numbers. How did we turn things around? Join us for an insightful session where we’ll unveil the strategies that revitalized our admissions marketing over five years. You’ll walk away not just with the story of our success but with actionable strategies and insights that you can apply at your institution to drive similar results. Don’t miss this opportunity to transform your admissions marketing approach and achieve real results.

It's Never Too Late: Recruiting the Adult Learner

For years, higher education marketers have studied what it takes to recruit and retain adult learners. While the numbers suggest that this focus is well-worth the effort, adult learner prospects can be the most elusive and challenging to convince.

Join us for a deep dive into a wealth of quantitative data from a consumer intelligence platform gathering data from 230 million adults in real time. We’ll identify insights about prospective adult learners that can inform compelling messaging for those ready to take their next step, as well as channel selection to meet them where they are.

The Power of Personalization for Enrollment Marketing

Are you looking for ways to deliver personalized digital content to meet the needs of your prospective student markets (and their parents)? This session, presented by Stephanie Geyer at the University of Montana, will deliver strategies to combine effective content strategy with website personalization to increase engagement, conversion, and yield. According to RNLs latest E-Expectations Report, 56% of students like or expect websites to show personalized content. It’s time to adapt to the modern learner and create website experiences that help them along their journey to enrollment.

Happy Birthday to Us!

Do you have an upcoming milestone anniversary? How does the marketing or communications team earn a seat at the table or actually lead the planning? An anniversary is an occasion to engage your community and to raise the public profile of your institution. Learn about the process and how to deliver a full plan to gain buy-in and energize your community. When Trinity College began its bicentennial planning, the marcomm team embraced its leadership role, making the most of an opportunity to celebrate and instill pride. Share and learn tips for planning and promotion. Make the most of your birthday!

Creating Outstanding Student Videos: A How-To Guide

You know you need authentic student-generated video content. But getting quality content at scale is hard and very time-consuming. In this dynamic conversation, CampusReel Co-Founder’s Nick Freud and Rob Carroll will be joined by Slippery Rock University’s Kayla Hersperger to discuss best practices around creating, curating and deploying student-generated video content.

Video is the most powerful tool we have on the internet to support digital marketing and recruitment initiatives. In addition to video creation tactics, CampusReel will share it’s playbook on how to maximize the ROI of each video created across each distinct platform (Social Media, Email Campaigns & Institutional websites).

Sponsored by: CampusReel

Exhibit Hall Break

Humanizing Higher Ed: Integrating Student Care Within Your Marketing Team

Discover Forsyth Tech’s groundbreaking integration of a Student Care model within their marketing framework, which was adopted in 2022, helping achieve unparalleled student engagement and support. This approach centers around a concierge-like service, offering a warm, human touch at student interaction points, focused on the steps from inquiry to enrollment. Witness how this model has redefined the marketing funnel, contributing to double-digit enrollment increases as well as increases in student completion and retention. This session explores the power of blending human-centric student care with strategic marketing, providing actionable insights for institutions aiming to elevate their student experience and success metrics.

Balancing Act: Engaging Multiple Generations with Digital Ads That Convert

Is your marketing team preparing for the largest generation to start engaging with your college’s content? The oldest members of Gen Alpha are about to enter high school, which means it’s time to understand how—and where—to reach them. Backed by Eduventures Research and supported by Encoura’s Digital Solutions, this session will explore how to engage multiple student and parent generations. You’ll hear firsthand the tactics that University of the Pacific has used to successfully engage the entire household throughout the funnel.

Going Global: Adapting Your Brand to New Markets

Higher education is changing rapidly. As we launch new campuses and degrees, we have to adapt our brand to new cultures and audiences. This presentation is a case study on how we adapted the Georgetown McDonough brand to a new culture in the Middle East when we opened a satellite campus and launched a new degree. Through adapting messaging, visual identity and target personas, we created a brand identity that was both different, but complimentary, to our existing brand. We learned which media tactics resonate with different cultures. This session will share best practices and lessons learned from going global.

View from the Table: The First Year

For years, higher ed marketers have been advocating for a seat at the leadership table. But what happens when you get there? In this panel discussion, hear from three higher ed veterans finishing their first year in their CMO roles at Duke, Temple, and the University of Oregon. This session will provide a view “from the table” that can help marketing leaders better understand the dynamics, opportunities and challenges they are likely to face as a CMO in the first year. Attendees will gain insight and practical strategies for anyone preparing for a leadership position, particularly in a new organization.

Future-Proof Marketing: Key Tools and Techniques to Help Your University Continue to Evolve and Thrive in our Everchanging World

Thriving in a Privacy-First Paradigm: Future-Proof Student Marketing | Net Natives
Third-party cookie deprecation and regulatory shifts are upon us! This poses new challenges to your
marketing and measurement efforts.
Join this session and learn innovative strategies from Net Natives to navigate the privacy-centric
future of Media 3.0.

What you’ll learn:
● What is Media 3.0 and how will it impact you?
● What do students think?
● Strategies to avoid measurement blindness, compliance headaches, and losing students’
trust.
● What tactics and techniques will help you thrive?

Join this session and learn innovative strategies from Net Natives to navigate the future of advertising
and student marketing – and stay ahead of your competition.

ATMOSPHERE TV

Beyond the Chatbot: The Future of AI-Powered Marketing | Digital Pulp
We’re just scratching the surface of how to use AI for higher education marketing. Most AI implementations have improved on existing marketing efforts, like generating social posts or building a better chatbot. It’s a good start, but not the revolution AI promised. As higher education marketers, we’re often trying to connect to someone who’s not in the room—the college student. Digging deeper into AI’s capabilities can help bridge that gap. In this talk, we’ll discuss how to use AI to create advanced personas that reflect the diverse needs, hopes and dreams of your student audiences. Then, we’ll show examples of how these dynamic personas can help shape your digital marketing strategy. You’ll walk away with a fresh take on AI, along with actionable insights and practical tips on how to supercharge your marketing while saving time and resources.

Keynote

Networking Reception

Breakfast

AI: From buzzword to blueprint for team success

Are you ready to hire a new employee who can quickly sift through data, foresee results, and streamline everyday tasks? Meet artificial intelligence (AI), the powerhouse set to transform your work. This session will explore how you can harness AI to drive innovation and elevate your team’s capabilities. It’s an opportunity to become a trailblazer, adopting AI to navigate the challenges of the modern workplace and unlock your team’s true potential. This is an opportunity to explore how your team can adopt similar approaches to achieve remarkable results and establish your institution as a beacon of progress and innovation.

Reframing Failure: Community Interventions for Student Wellbeing

Emory University shares their multi-channel campaign focused on stories of toxic perfectionism from faculty and staff, normalizing challenges we all face and encouraging students to join one another in conversation through in-person engagement opportunities. Attendees will engage with the marketing campaign and its bold yet intimate visuals, learning about the deployment strategy and on-going creative strategies for addressing student mental health on campus. The presentation will highlight ideas for leveraging your brand beyond reputational efforts to solve real-time campus issues, strategies to expand social campaign impacts into physical spaces, and methods for building student buy-in.

Game On! A Winning Formula for Brand Success

Reflecting on over a decade of athletic triumphs (and one significant setback), TCU recognizes the profound impact of college sports on brand awareness and perception. This session delves into case studies like “Toad to Omaha,” “Frogs in the City” and “Horned Frogs Thrive in the Desert” to demonstrate tangible benefits: increased web traffic, social engagement, applications and philanthropic support, as well as ad value equivalencies unmatched by paid tactics. Key strategies to be discussed include interdepartmental collaboration, leveraging unique channels to encourage user-generated content and media coverage, connecting athletic and academic success, engaging with community partners, and acknowledging local support.

Closing Keynote