Developing Boise State Online’s Blue Portfolio Campaign
Marketing Campaign x Advertising Design.
ROLE
Creatives Services Coordinator
Designer on a team of marketing and creative professionals
Boise State Online shifted from a thematic campaign to a portfolio-level strategy campaign within our marketing. This strategic overhaul optimized our prospective students journey, aligning campaigns with targeted industry verticals and expanded our career focus.
Taking a strategic approach, we developed 5 industry-focused portfolio campaigns and aligned 15 program-specific campaigns, creating a full suite of assets. The creative team efficiently organized and executed content shoots, designed dynamic digital ad suites, curated organic social media content, and played a pivotal role in the website revamp, while also providing valuable input on other team members' projects. This strategic transformation showcases my proficiency in optimizing digital campaigns for precise impact and contributing well-designed assets to an overarching strategic campaign.
BACKGROUND
Our main challenge was balancing seamless student experiences with our new digital campaign strategies focused on both lead generation and awareness, while maximizing our team’s resources. Adapting the university’s campaign, Blue Turf Thinking, to Boise State Online's audience required a well-thought out appraoch and refreshed creative assets. Developing unified content within the portfolio structure while extending it to each program was a larger challenge.
CHALLENGE
Develop a strategic campaign that uses industry verticals through a portfolio structure to gain awareness.
Refresh existing program campaigns to align with the portfolio strategy and create a seamless student experience to generate leads.
Develop creative assets to support both the portfolio awareness campaign and each program’s revised campaigns. Align Boise State Online’s creative direction with Blue Turf Thinking, the university wide campaign.
GOALS
Over 6 months, we utilized a phased approach, focusing on portfolio-level assets initially, followed by refreshing programs. My role involved content planning, coordination, and design for both portfolios and program assets. We initiated the project with competitor research on portfolio-style marketing campaigns within verticals.
RESEARCH & PLANNING
CONTENT SHOOTS
I Introduced a new planning template optimizing our content shoot days for efficiency and diversity within shots. A meticulous planning stage ensured authentic representation and inclusivity. In production we edit images to fit Boise State Online, emphasizing visual storytelling for each portfolio and program. Our ongoing content efforts aim to showcase authentic student experiences and foster a sense of belonging for students.
DIGITAL ADVERTISING
Digital advertisements for our portfolios and programs run across paid social platforms, including google banner ads, Facebook, Instagram and Linkedin. Collaborating with marketing, we choose images and copy based on past performance and design ads in various sizes for campaign needs. A detailed review process before ads reach carefully targeted audiences is our final quality check.
We developed a comprehensive flyer showcasing Boise State Online programs in the Portfolio structure. This piece was developed to be evergreen and continue to be in use as we continue to add new online programs.
RESULTS
5 comprehensive portfolio campaigns were live on Oct 1st, with all program campaigns refreshed by late spring. We produced 15 ad sets that all had a cohesive look and aligned with the larger university's Blue Turf Thinking campaign. We conducted 3 portfolio level content shoots so far using the new planning process, enhancing collaboration on our team.
We implemented a creative refresh process for ongoing maintenance, capturing content annually for each portfolio and program and refreshing design work biannually. This will keep our content up to date and always going through a new iteration.
Our team executed a highly successful project that revolutionized our approach to digital marketing campaigns. This streamlined process ensures easy adaptability and leverages the individual expertise of each team member. Our overarching goal is to align our programs with students' career-oriented interests. In an era where higher education faces inquisition about its value, our implementation of this campaign positions us ahead of our competitors within online education.
As we continue to develop digital marketing campaigns our team has learned how to to leverage adaptability and individual team expertise to create innovative solutions. The proactive approach positions Boise State Online ahead in proving the value of higher education in a challenging landscape.
CONCLUSION
Competitor and Campaign Research
Marketing Content Shoot Planning and Coordination
Marketing and Creative Strategy
Brand Alignment
Visual Design and Storytelling
Print Design and Production
Campaign Design and Execution
