Winning Strategies for Higher Education Marketers in 2025
Registration for this event is free! All sessions will be recorded and available on-demand for six months after airing.
Higher education marketers, like you, play a critical role in ensuring that prospective students have the best possible chance and experience in enrolling and, eventually, graduating from these higher education institutions. As competition for student enrollment grows and digital marketing continues to evolve, it’s essential to stay on the cutting edge of strategies that resonate with prospective students and drive enrollment success.
Join us for this free virtual conference, where you’ll gain practical tools and actionable insights designed to enhance your recruitment, engagement, and retention efforts in the 2025 school year and beyond. Learn from industry leaders and connect with fellow professionals to navigate the unique challenges of higher education marketing in today’s landscape.
Key Takeaways
- Enrollment Funnel Optimization: Discover strategies to fine-tune every stage of the student enrollment journey, from awareness to application.
- Personalized Student Engagement: Learn how to create tailored marketing campaigns that resonate with prospective students and their unique needs.
- Leveraging Data for Student Success: Explore how data-driven insights can improve both marketing strategies and student retention rates.
- Innovative Recruitment Techniques: Gain practical knowledge on the latest trends in digital and content marketing to attract and convert more prospective students.
April 29, 2025 | 10:00 a.m. CT
Vicky Irwin
Senior Director, Consultancy, Times Higher Education
April 29, 2025 | 10:00 a.m. CT
Fiona Morrison
Director, Strategic Marketing, Times Higher Education
April 30, 2025 | 10:00 a.m. CT
Bill Campbell
Vice President of Operations & Communications, Chatham University
April 30, 2025 | 10:00 a.m. CT
Dr. Teresa Valerio Parrot, APR
Principal, TVP Communications
Become an AMA Professional Certified Marketer (PCM®)
Achieving PCM® status opens you to a world of possibilities, earning you respect and credibility from peers and employers. Our programs are flexible, yet rigorous enough to show you have stand-out knowledge to solve modern business challenges.
Are you already an AMA Professional Certified Marketer®️? This training is worth 4 Continuing Education Units (CEUs). Record your CEU’s to maintain your PCM®️ certification.
DAY 1 (ALL TIMES IN CST)
Keynote | Reputation Matters: Understanding How Students Perceive Your Institution in a Competitive Landscape
With options for higher education study increasing, prospective students are struggling with choice overwhelm. And an institution’s reputation plays a crucial role in student recruitment. However, understanding and measuring your reputation can seem daunting. How can you measure and quantify people’s opinions, feelings and perceptions of your brand!
The good news is, you don’t have to sit back and accept public sentiment. There are many opportunities to shape these perceptions as they are formed, and mold those that are already there.
And it all starts with research. Having a greater awareness of student perceptions, as well as understanding needs and barriers, is integral to achieve sustainable competitive advantage.
We talk you through how you can take a consultative and data-driven approach to long-term reputation building through a deep evaluation of your brand. As well as insights, we will share a case study of how researching and measuring student opinions can help to inform your future communications strategies.
Vicky Irwin
Senior Director, Consultancy | Times Higher Education
Fiona Morrison
Director, Strategic Marketing
How to Build Experiences for Your Higher Ed Marketing Funnel
The “Higher-Ed Metrics Framework” is a step-by-step approach to aligning your school’s marketing efforts with its goals. In this session, you’ll learn how a metrics funnel works—and how to work the funnel. We’ll dive deep into one part of the funnel, and give you tools and resources to build and plan out your own.
In short, you’ll learn how to, in a clear and distinct way, escort students from prospects to enrollees to alumni. In each phase of the funnel, you’ll discover tactics to connect your work, data, and outcomes. Whatever your current challenge—e.g., growing enrollment, boosting graduation rates, increasing donations, etc.—mastering the Higher-Ed Metrics Funnel will make your daily work more meaningful and transparent.
Learning Outcomes:
- How to tie marketing outcomes to organizational success
- Identifying the right metrics for the interest phase of the funnel
- Avoiding common pitfalls with tools and data distractions
- Research methods that provide a solid foundation for decision-making
Mike Steckel
MLIS Vice President of UX & Research Mighty Citizen
From Content Chaos to Scalable Success: How LMU Transformed their Creative Workflows
Managing content effectively is a challenge for most higher education institutions, where marketing and communications teams juggle vast amounts of digital assets across departments and schools. Loyola Marymount University (LMU) tackled these challenges head-on by implementing an AI powered Digital Asset Management (DAM) system, with the key goals of streamlining workflows, strengthening collaboration, and enhancing brand consistency. Join Greg Stewart and Ariana Keil, Marketing Manager at Canto, for this session exploring LMU’s journey to DAM success. They’ll dive into the university’s initial challenges, their strategic approach to implementation, and the key benefits they’ve realized—such as improved efficiency, creative workflow optimization, and stronger content security.
Join this session as they share:
- How Greg and his team structured a successful DAM rollout, including stakeholder buy-in and phased adoption.
- Strategies for driving ongoing user adoption and maintaining governance across teams.
- The measurable impact of DAM on collaboration, productivity, and content workflows.
Whether you’ve recently hit your content chaos breaking point, or if you’re already exploring Digital Asset Management, this session will provide helpful insights for how to take control of your digital assets and elevate your content operations. Don’t miss this opportunity to learn from LMU’s experience and get expert advice on unlocking the full potential of DAM in higher education!
Elevating Campus Content: How Higher Ed Institutions Improve Experiences with Digital Asset Management
Join us for an inside look at how leading colleges and universities are leveraging Digital Asset Management (DAM) to tailor experiences across departments.
In this session, we’ll explore how:
- Higher ed institutions use DAM to centralize creative assets & streamline collaboration
- Empowering teams to deliver consistent, on-brand messaging
- Improving operational efficiency, and elevating the campus experience at every touchpoint.
- Whether you’re part of the marketing team or managing communications across multiple faculties, you’ll walk away with actionable strategies to maximize your institution’s content.
DAY 2 (ALL TIMES IN CST)
Keynote | Revenue & Reputation: The Key to Sustainable Growth in Higher Ed Marketing
Today’s higher education marketing and communication professionals increasingly have an interconnected mandate to build and protect reputation while driving revenue. Traditional revenue streams have shifted or decreased due to market, demographic, or policy changes, while institutional and sector-wide reputations are being challenged daily. Both trends negatively impact short- and long-term revenue generation and increase expectations for marketing teams to deliver new revenue diversification and reputation management approaches. In this session, Bill Campbell and Teresa Valerio Parrot, 2025 co-chairs for the AMA Symposium for the Marketing of Higher Education, will discuss the pressures for marketers to deliver revenue and reputation growth and outline how they have incorporated these topics into the call for proposals for this year’s conference.
Bill Campbell
Vice President of Operations and Communications, Chatham University
Dr. Teresa Valerio Parrot, APR
Principal of TVP Communications
AI-Ready Marketing That Stays Human
Your perfect-fit students are scrolling past you because 93% of prospective students now use AI platforms to research educational options, yet many institutions remain invisible. Join Dave Hunt, Director of Enrollment Marketing & Communication, University of Kansas and Mike Bell, CMO, Everspring for an insightful session on balancing technical optimization with authentic brand expression to ensure your visibility. During this session, you’ll learn actionable strategies to: Create content strategies that preserve institutional voice while optimizing for AI Implement technical optimizations for enhanced visibility in AI search Apply proven strategies from real-world AI search success stories Build scalable frameworks for consistent, high-impact content Put our exclusive optimization guide to work immediately Don’t miss this rare opportunity to learn directly from a marketing leader who’s solving the same challenges you face every day—how to stand out authentically when everyone is fighting for the same digital attention.
Dave Hunt
Director of Enrollment Marketing & Communications, University of Kansas
Mike Bell
Chief Marketing Officer, Everspring
How GVSU's Smarter Site Search Drove a 49% Engagement Boost
Grand Valley State University (GVSU) transformed its website search into a strategic marketing asset, increasing search click-through rates (CTR) by 49% and making key content more accessible to current and prospective students, faculty and staff. With nearly 40% of web visitors using search, GVSU’s marketing team recognized a major opportunity to improve engagement, support enrollment efforts, and enhance the user experience.
This session will reveal how GVSU leveraged real-time search analytics and user behavior insights to surface the most sought-after content and ensure students found the information they needed faster – all without relying on developers.
By the end of the session, you’ll know how to optimize your own university’s search function to improve content discovery, support enrollment efforts, and strengthen brand perception.
Key Takeaways:
- Data-Driven Search Optimization: Learn how GVSU used search analytics to identify visitor intent and surface the most sought-after content.
- Marketing Agility in Action: See how the marketing team quickly adapted search results, promoted key content, and made real-time updates—without waiting on developers.
- Immediate Impact on Engagement: See how simple search enhancements led to a 49% increase in CTR and improved user satisfaction.
Josh Isaak
Associate Vice President of Web Development and Content Strategy, Grand Valley State University
Jeff Dillon
Digital Strategist, SearchStax
Bill Campbell
Vice President of Operations and Communications, Chatham UniversityBill Campbell is an award-winning marketing, technology, and communications leader skilled in creating a unique brand voice, building awareness, improving operations, and driving revenue. He serves as the vice president of operations and communications at Chatham University in Pittsburgh, PA, where he provides strategic leadership and oversees all aspects of the Campus Services division, which includes Marketing & Communications, Information Technology, Facilities Management, Events & Conference Services, the Campus Gear Store, and the Post Office/Print Center. Joining Chatham in 2012 as the vice president of marketing and communications, Campbell helped lead the successful coed transition of Chatham’s 145-year-old undergraduate women’s college and served as the interim vice president of enrollment management. In 2015, he was honored with the American Marketing Association’s Higher Education Marketer of the Year for his team’s efforts. Before Chatham, he worked for over a decade at a brand and marketing agency in North Carolina, culminating in his role as the vice president of brand strategy. He began his career in the nonprofit sector as the director of annual giving and operations for the V Foundation for Cancer Research. He holds a B.A. from the University of Illinois and an MBA from Western Governors University (WGU).
Dr. Teresa Valerio Parrot, APR
Principal of TVP CommunicationsDr. Teresa Valerio Parrot, APR, is principal of TVP Communications, where she works at the intersection of leadership and communications. Valerio Parrot is known for honesty juxtaposed with optimism, and she helps higher education executives truthfully share excellence and genuinely own mistakes through their communications and actions in their proactive and crisis outreach. She is co-host of the Trusted Voices Podcast, co-editor of Call to Action for Inside Higher Ed, has numerous bylines with national and higher education media, and is a frequent keynote speaker. She was awarded the Crystal Apple Award for Teaching Excellence by CASE, serves as a CASE Laureate, and was honored by PR News. Valerio Parrot serves as secretary of the board of directors for the Public Relations Society of America, co-chairs the American Marketing Association’s higher education symposium, and serves on the boards of the PRSA Foundation and the Denver area Scientific and Cultural Facilities District.
Vicky Irwin
Senior Director, Consultancy | Times Higher EducationVicky Irwin – Senior Director, Consultancy
A passionate and innovative senior marketing professional, Vicky joined Times Higher Education last year, with over 15 years of client relationship and project management experience and extensive business and strategic marketing consultancy knowledge.
For the last decade, Vicky has specialised within the HE sector and has managed a wide range of strategic marketing projects for universities across the globe.
For part of her career, Vicky worked for a UK-based OPM, driving online and distance learning programme strategy for partner institutions and providing brand and marketing solutions, student recruitment and student retention on behalf of clients, ensuring exceptional student experience throughout their journey.
She has recently been elected as a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing and is in the final stages of completing an MBA with Warwick Business School.
Fiona Morrison
Director, Strategic MarketingA strategic marketing and comms lead with 15 years’ experience, Fiona joined THE in 2024 from her role as Head of Marketing and Brand Development at the University of Aberdeen, where she spearheaded the award-winning ‘Beyond Boundaries’ rebrand.
Having also worked at Heriot-Watt University and King Saud University; alongside developing growth strategies for global Luxury brands based in the UK, Europe and China, Fiona combines a commercial, international outlook with Higher Education expertise, to empower institutions to stand out with confidence and conviction.
Specialising in reputation building and brand strategy, Fiona helps connect internal stakeholders with external audiences in support of student recruitment, research, and funding ambitions. She also leads the Times Higher Education W100 Reputation Network – bringing Marcomms leaders together through CPD, learning and networking opportunities.
Mike Steckel
MLIS Vice President of UX & Research Mighty CitizenAs Vice President of UX & Research, Mike oversees a team of information architects and researchers who build strategic and effective solutions for our clients. He’s involved at every stage of our projects—from the early days of discovery and research, through content strategy, and eventually to launch and testing.
Mike’s a relentless examiner: Why this way instead of that way? How can we make this better? Who said we have to follow the rules?
With extensive experience in all elements of UX design—including many years working for giants like National Instruments—Mike is one of the thinkers (and tireless doers) that Mighty Citizen runs on.
When he’s not obsessing over a wireframe, content matrix, or user survey script, Mike enjoys reading, watching his three sons grow into adulthood, cycling around his home in central Austin, and talking about music of all kinds. (Don’t get him started on The Beatles or Radiohead.)
Dave Hunt
Director of Enrollment Marketing & Communications, University of KansasDave Hunt, Director of Enrollment Marketing & Communications, University of Kansas. I love the art of storytelling – piecing together all of the details, large and small, forming them into a cohesive whole, and expressing the story in an engaging, thought-provoking, and entertaining way. It’s particularly rewarding in marketing when you can find a brand story that resonates at an emotional level with your target audience, driving them to take action and make a positive impact on their lives.
Simon Sinek’s “Start With Why” forms the core of my marketing philosophy. The “what we do” and “how we do it” matter, but it’s “WHY we do what we do” that lies at our emotional core. Decisions are made through this core, and when you can take a story and connect with a person’s core, you’re earning a customer for life.
Mike Bell
Chief Marketing Officer, EverspringMike has over 15 years of experience delivering strategic marketing, brand management and digital acquisition across the e-commerce, retail, fintech, edtech and adtech verticals. Prior to joining Everspring, Mike was the CMO and co-founder of Persosa, an experience-management solution that was recently acquired by Carvana. Before Persosa, Mike led all digital marketing efforts for the LifeLock brand through their IPO. LifeLock established the identity theft protection category in the U.S. and was acquired in 2016 by Symantec for $2.3 billion. Before shifting into marketing, Mike spent eight years as a Captain in the United States Air Force. Mike is a graduate of Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, where he received a bachelor’s degree in Aeronautical Sciences. In addition, he holds an MBA in finance from the Carl H. Lindner College of Business at the University of Cincinnati.
Josh Isaak
Associate Vice President of Web Development and Content Strategy, Grand Valley State UniversityJosh Isaak is the Associate Vice President of Web Development and Content Strategy in the marketing department at Grand Valley State University. He leads a team responsible for the university’s custom CMS, web development, content strategy , and web analytics. Josh has over 20 years of web-based experience in the realms of design, development and leadership. Before joining the web team at GVSU, Josh was the Director of Web Services at Davenport University. Jeff Dillon – Digital Strategist at SearchStax Jeff Dillon is the Digital Strategist for Higher Education at SearchStax and is the founder of EdTech Connect, a technology marketplace designed exclusively for the higher education community. Jeff has more than 20 years of leadership experience in the higher education technology sector with expertise in search engines, artificial intelligence, digital experience platforms, personalization strategies and communication tools.
Jeff Dillon
Digital Strategist, SearchStaxJeff Dillon is the Digital Strategist for Higher Education at SearchStax and is the founder of EdTech Connect, a technology marketplace designed exclusively for the higher education community. Jeff has more than 20 years of leadership experience in the higher education technology sector with expertise in search engines, artificial intelligence, digital experience platforms, personalization strategies and communication tools.
