Marketing101: On Educational Institutions

I didn't finish a marketing degree. I only had one marketing course back in college and it's not product marketing but political marketing.

Now that I'm studying communication research, I get communication strategies and not really marketing strategies. Yet, my daily life is about selling and marketing. That's why sometimes it's hard to be thinking of means to market a product or company [I was not trained for that]. It's even harder if you are to market or PR an educational institution.

We we're trying to brainstorm for the Marketing Communication Plan of an educational institution. It seemed that all the participants were having a hard time to provide their insights. This may be primarily due to the fact that we all came from different schools and none of us came from the school we're brainstorming for.

Most were aligned to think of the "reality" than the "ideals" that the school would like to communicate. I guess, I am one of those who are trying to play between the reality and the ideals. I still would want to communicate the "ideal" but with the bounds of "realities."

Marketing a school is like marketing a personality or a political institution. Both are bounded to conveying "ideals". The aim is to entice people to believe in that they can provide these promises and they have the sense of "idealism."

Same with marketing a politician or a political institution, I guess, marketing an educational institution requires in depth knowledge. It also requires being a supporter of the ideals and the values of the institution. A good write-up for a political institution could come from a member of the party. I guess the same goes with writing for an educational institution, someone who belongs to that institution could give the best marketing ideas.

But then, as part of a PR and AD agency that handles this institutional account, we're tasked to well immerse our selves with the ideas and beliefs of the institution to come up with a good marketing communications plan.

Still, it's hard. It's like campaigning for politician that you don't really believe.