In an ideal world, we would have a target persona for each audience and project we work on. In the real world, this hardly ever happens. We all know how it goes: We’ve got five different projects we’re working on, no time to finish what we have, and another one gets thrown on our plate that […]

When it comes to social media marketing, video is king. Most of us are visual learners (around 65% of the population, according to Social Science Research Network), so videos are a great way to get your messages across. One trap I see many brands fall into is creating videos that feel scripted or inauthentic. At […]

You’ve probably heard some talk around campus about this DSP. What the heck is this thing? And why in the world should you care?    First the boring part – explaining what a DSP is. A DSP is a Demand-Side-Platform, which in essence is a form of software used by us advertisers to place all different kinds of […]

After last week’s conversation with Lisa Bralts and Kendra Wieneke (members of the Siebel Center for Design team), they put together four simple tips to help marcom professionals on campus dip our toes into design thinking. Here’s to better creativity, problem solving, and deliverables! 1. Start at the end (user). At the outset of a project, consider […]

I’ve been thinking a lot about the creative process lately. It’s absolutely critical in marketing when it comes to engaging our audiences, yet when time is short it can be the first thing to go. I decided to ask two members of the Siebel Center for Design (SCD) team to share some insight on how […]

If you’re looking for inspiration for how to take our campus-wide brand guidelines and customize them for your unit, LAS has recently published a great page of “Guides, materials, and resources for LAS communicators” on their website. Even if your unit is much smaller than LAS, I think there are good ideas you could adapt […]

Do you know how your audience thinks, why they choose one major or program over another, and what words and phrases they use when talking about their desire to continue their education? This is the type of information that surfaced in a recent project with the College of Media, and it’s exactly what’s needed to […]

You may have seen an email about a week ago from Web Services, announcing the release of two new Webtools skins that incorporate our campus-wide brand standards. Take a look at the basic instructions for the skin here, and feel free to reach out to Web Services if you have any questions or issues using […]

Weeks and months in the making, our first-ever virtual IlliniFest is almost here. On March 7, at 7:00 pm, alumni and others will tune into YouTube from locations near and far to reconnect with the university that helped shape who they are as humans. It’s a powerful connection that pays forward for generations, in a […]

Where’s my wordmark?? It’s a question we’ve heard many variations of in the past six months, and for good reason. We realize the shift is not a small one, but it is an important part of our brand strategy. In January we led a workshop on the topic. This blog post draws from that workshop, […]