Ongoing Education for Higher Ed Marketers
Client
Arizona State University Marketing Hub
Location
Main Campus, Tempe, AZ, USA
Services Provided
- A year-long training series featuring best-in-class lessons on social media, content marketing, influencer marketing and email marketing to ASU’s team of 400+ marketers
Overview
A united team is more efficient and productive. One way to bring a team together is to get them sharing the same experiences and speaking the same language: through learning. The ASU Marketing Hub proves that higher learning isn’t just for the ASU academic environment—it’s for the pros, too.
Situation
The ASU Marketing Hub serves as the core brand marketing team for the university. Responsible for all brand attributes for the institution at large, the Marketing Hub team also supports individual college and stakeholder groups around the school. The ASU Marketing Hub sought out Convince & Convert to create an ongoing training series to keep all ASU marketers on point with the current trends in digital marketing.
Challenges
- We needed to create a training program to appeal to each of the various skill levels of 400+ marketers.
- The program needed to be equally compelling for in-person as well as virtual attendees.
- Topics needed to include digital marketing and feature best practices and examples that would be immediately applicable to the majority of ASU marketers.
Solution
Convince & Convert created a six-part training program spanning a 10-month time frame. The program kicked off with a “State of Marketing” address, followed by Jay’s keynote address on “Youtility: Why Smart Marketing Is About Help Not Hype.” Open to all ASU marketers, this live event was a great way to build enthusiasm around the training series and provide a value-add opportunity for team networking before and after the event.
Following this, two virtual training sessions were offered. The Marketing Hub team gave input on the topics based on the top questions they are asked from their peer marketers around the institution. By infusing the training with ASU and other higher education examples and best practices, attendees were able to see immediate ways to apply the training to their marketing plans.
Midway through the program, the ASU main campus hosted another live event. Again offering a mid-year update institutional marketing initiatives, Jay also was on hand for a keynote address on Hug Your Haters—an application of how student reviews and ratings can be turned into marketing gold.
The series concluded with two additional virtual trainings. In all, the four virtual training topics included:
- The Six Email Tips, Trends, and Tools You Need to Know
- Instagram and Snapchat Best Practices for Higher Education
- How to Optimize Social Media Content with #Hashtags and UGC
- Winning the Influencer Outreach Game
Each training session was made available on the ASU intranet, enabling members to access the content and share with other team members.
Results
- In-person events had approximately 50% attendance from ASU marketing personnel.
- Virtual training averaged 25% attendance on the first day of availability, increasing to near 30% over time.
