University Advancement Blog

31 May

Beyond the brand: The marketing department of the future

The following is a post that I wrote earlier this semester for Inside Higher Ed’s Call to Action marketing and communications blog. Today, higher education marketing tends to be an end-of-the-pipeline activity, based on raising awareness of and generating interest in programs...
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2 May

Articulating your institution’s employer brand

The following is a post that I wrote earlier this semester for Inside Higher Ed’s Call to Action marketing and communications blog. Faculty and staff are the heart of an institution. Colleges and universities have hundreds and sometimes thousands of employees who...
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25 Jan

3 takeaways from Shoe Dog: A Memoir by the Creator of Nike

As I’ve written about previously, we established a marketers’ book club on our campus in 2016, where each semester interested staff read a non-marketing book that has marketing implications and then gather at the end of the semester for a...
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7 Dec

Total marketing spend: The hard questions

The following is a post that I wrote earlier this semester for Inside Higher Ed’s Call to Action marketing and communications blog. A corporate CMO expects to control her organization’s marketing expenditures. But universities operate differently. On most campuses – and especially...
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31 Aug

Are we asking higher ed advertising to do too much?

The following is an August 2017 post that I wrote for Inside Higher Ed’s Call to Action marketing and communications blog. In The Inevitable: Understanding the 12 Technological Forces That Will Shape Our Future, author Kevin Kelly envisions a day when “the buildings...
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25 May

The language of higher ed marketing

The following is a May 2017 post that I wrote for Inside Higher Ed’s Call to Action marketing and communications blog. At the AMA Symposium for the Marketing of Higher Education this past December, SUNY Chancellor Nancy Zimpher advised marketers to frame...
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4 Apr

The chief connection officer

The following is a March 2017 post that I wrote for Inside Higher Ed’s Call to Action marketing and communications blog. Colleges and universities are organized into functional silos, while our audiences view our institutions holistically. As marketing and communications professionals, we...
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25 Jan

Make a gift, build a brand (internally)

The following is an December 2016 post that I wrote for Inside Higher Ed’s Call to Action marketing and communications blog. For a university’s brand strategy to be focused, authentic, compelling, differentiating, and enduring, it must be built from the inside out....
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9 Jan

3 takeaways from Originals

This past fall semester I started a book club for marketers on our campus, and our first book was Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World by Wharton professor Adam Grant. Originals is full of unique insights, such as the creative...
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8 Jan

Branded house, house of brands, or something else?

The following is an December 2016 post that I wrote for Inside Higher Ed’s Call to Action marketing and communications blog. When chief marketing officer Dan Dillon came to Arizona State University in 2013, determining whether the university was going to be...
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The University Advancement Blog

Rob Zinkan's thoughts and recommended readings on university advancement