What Higher Ed Marketers Can Learn From Retail, B2B, Financial Services and Nonprofit Brands

For the first half of our company’s journey, we learned marketing by solving hard problems across retail, B2B, financial services and nonprofits. Then we brought that hard won understanding to higher education. What emerged was a higher standard for colleges and universities where design, data, story and deep empathy for students come together to drive enrollment, strengthen retention and build enduring brands. Here are a few key lessons we learned from each industry along the way:

1. From Retail Brands: we learned the art of branding and merchandising. Over the past two decades, we began treating colleges as cherished brands, each being the sum of all of its experiences. Next we introduced the concept of cross-selling of related programs into academic program pages, a classic merchandising technique. The list goes on.
2. From B2B Brands: we learned how to win trust in complex, high-stakes decisions shaped by many voices. We brought that clarity to higher education, designing experiences that speak to every decision maker and influencer — providing them with career guidance and thought leadership content at every stage of a multi-year process of sharping a brand preference.
3. From Financial Services Brands: we learned how trust is built over time and why relationships matter more than transactions. We applied that thinking to education institutions by credentializing them and positioning them as institutions of lifelong learning.
4. From Non-Profit Brands: we learned that people support causes which deeply understand them. We brought mission driven storytelling to higher education, making students and alumni the hero and letting the institution serve as the enabler of hero’s journey.

If you are seeking a transformative higher education marketing agency, college branding agency, college website design agency, or enrollment marketing agency, please see our work and consider partnering with us.