SimpsonScarborough is the data-driven partner for higher education marketers. 

Fifteen years ago, Christopher Simpson and I took the plunge and launched SimpsonScarborough. He was the Simpson and I was the Scarborough. Like Donny and Marie, he was a little bit crisis comms and media relations, and I was a little bit market research and marketing strategy. Back then, most universities still had a news bureau. Most communications departments existed within the Advancement function. “Marketing” hadn’t been added to “communications & marketing” yet. No more than 300 people attended the annual AMA Symposium. CMOs didn’t exist in higher ed. Shoot, we were barely able to use the word “marketing," and we could still get in real trouble for using the word “branding.” And I will never forget that time circa 2007 that I referred to students as “customers” in front of a university president.

Our ongoing series about the Future of Higher Ed MarComms is focused on all of the topics that we believed were important to address in a pre-covid environment, and in a world turned upside down by the pandemic, these topics have evolved from important to urgent. After all, one of the lasting impacts of the pandemic has been the acceleration of digital disruption across all industries — higher ed notwithstanding. But, this isn't just a time to react and adapt, it's a time to innovate and think strategically about what's next.

How can institutions build and sustain trust with students and influencers in a fragile, virtual environment?  In this age of impending cookie-less environments, heightened demands for data privacy , and a widening gap between brand safety measures and inflammatory online rhetoric, brands are navigating a field of landmines in an effort to connect with their audiences. This is newer territory for most institutions who are eyeing digital channels for the majority of their FY21 and FY22 budgets as a lifeline for marketing and enrollment. W hile it may seem overwhelming, there are some fundamental approaches that institutions can use to remain strategic with their available funds and support short term enrollment and yield, all while keeping their sights set on long term brand objectives. 

In the month ahead, SimpsonScarborough will celebrate its 15th year in business, and I'll celebrate my seventh year with the agency. Time sure flies when you're doing great work (and having fun doing it). But when I think about what I'm most proud of in being a part of SimpsonScarborough, it's the unique combination of our people and the culture we've built, the impact we've been able to have with our clients and, more broadly, playing a part in moving higher ed marketing forward. For those of us that have been in this industry a long time, it's easy to point to long-held challenges—lack of budget, decentralized silos, marketing as the campus Kinko's, daily crisis dominating everything, and a constant revolving door of senior leaders. It's harder to pause and recognize just how much our industry has changed and improved. 

SimpsonScarborough is exceptionally proud to announce the promotion of Meredith Simpson to Vice President of Research. Meredith was one of SimpsonScarborough's first hires back in 2006 after she graduated from the University of Richmond, where she earned a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration. I sat down with her to hear how she's grown as a researcher over the past 15 years, how SimpsonScarborough's evolved in that time, and what people can expect from the research team in the next year. 

Over the past several years, public-private partnerships (P3s) have become increasingly common in higher ed. Like most P3s around the country, their focus is usually related to infrastructure, much like the oft-cited P3 at Ohio State University, or more recent examples such as the University of Kentucky, the University of Iowa, and the largest P3 ever completed in the United States — the University of California-Merced. 

How to find the balance between influencer partnerships that drive value and the fluidity in brand guidelines that success requires.  Witty repertoire? Check. Unique, interesting idea that keeps people entertained or engaged? Check. Growing following on a social channel? Check. In today's digital environment, all social media users need is a good idea and the enthusiasm or passion to promote it, and they can skyrocket into the coveted realm of 'influencer'. Influencers have grown to carve out a comfortable portion of the advertising market on social channels, partnering with brands all over the globe to promote products and experiences. And the impact is noticeable. A firmly rooted trust between influencers and their audiences provides brands an established market to reach their target audiences and the potential to leverage that trust to generate interest in their own offering. 

2020. As soon as you say it, the wave of crappiness is upon you. It's been a year that has simultaneously felt like its lasted forever while also being a bit of a blur. It's like the wise adage for young parents — "the days are long, but the years are short." 

Things don't move backward, but sometimes you have to look back to see they've been moving forward the whole time.  My keyboard stopped working. This would eventually lead to me presenting on Zoom next to a Belk and Auntie Annie's, but that's a story for another day. When I mentioned my MacBook troubles to a teammate, she said, "well, Mercury is in Retrograde." I had no idea why that had anything to do with my keyboard because, and this will shock nobody, I know nothing about astronomy. But she informed me of the definition, and I soon understood why everyone on Twitter was blaming the entirety of 2020 on said phenomenon. I also learned an important lesson — that things only appear to move backward, and in time it becomes evident that they are moving forward again and have been the whole time.  This has been a hard year to find hope. Like many of you, I've had family members contract the virus, and, thankfully, they've all recovered. We held a masked Thanksgiving, which was a little sad, and the mask made it a little harder to take sneak a pull off the bottle of chardonnay in the refrigerator, but in the end, a good time was had by all. Our girls are learning virtually, and while we manage occasional meltdowns, we're learning 6th-grade math again and watching teachers do the impossible day after day. Some of us found an unexpected source of hope in a fictional character named Ted Lasso. I relate a little too closely with the character in that I spend Saturday mornings watching Premier League football confused by offsides calls and operating too often on blind hope. Lately, that sense of hope is getting stronger and stronger. Maybe it's the arrival of a vaccine. Maybe it's the departure of Betsy DeVos. Or maybe, like Mercury, hope spent a good bit of time in retrograde this year, and I needed to move backward to see it more clearly.  Let's start with the present. Today feels completely different yet eerily similar to where we were in late spring and early fall. COVID is spiking to all-time highs, causing colleges and universities to shift or justify their spring plans, although not at the scale of the spring and fall, given many schools opted for a virtual spring long ago. Similarly, early returns on the class of 2021 are not good, especially for first-generation students or minority and other underserved populations. We knew the virus would hit those groups harder, and it's showing. That said, many schools are feeling much more optimistic about a more normal Fall 2021, and that's certainly something to be hopeful for. The same can be said for the experiences gained from last spring, as that level of innovation in marketing and enrollment management will be put to good use this spring.  Just before Thanksgiving, news of vaccine efficacy began to break. Of course, higher education was at the forefront, with Johns Hopkins and Emory playing significant roles in the development or clinical trials of different vaccines. It always seems strange to me that higher ed doesn't get more credit. But if you think back historically, institutions have always been vital to society while simultaneously being devalued by that same society. The situation is just as polarizing today, but I'm hopeful because I know our colleges and universities are not going anywhere and will always contribute to the public good.  Fall and summer 2020 seemingly blended together this year. There was no natural break. Institutions created and recreated opening plans while at the same time making crucial decisions about policies regarding diversity, equity, and inclusion as the largest civil rights movement in a generation unfolded. While a study in crisis communications continued, silos across campuses began to break down as collaboration between groups like marketing & enrollment and marketing & student affairs really paid off on a lot of campuses. There's certainly hope that the work produced in this period is among the best and most strategic we've seen in higher ed communications.  April and May can only be summed up with unbelievable uncertainty. Everyone and everything was virtual, and millions of people lost their jobs, including many across higher ed. On a hopeful note, we saw an industry oft described as slow to innovate turn more like a drift racer than a cruise ship captain. The product took on a new form, and while research showed that virtual learning remained unpopular, it offered a glimpse of what higher education could become as universities were forced to confront the combination of product delivery, cost, and value. I'm hopeful that this conversation continues, as I think innovation in how the product is delivered and how much it costs not only helps to educate more people but also boosts the public perception of the sector.  March 11th. A date where seven weeks of information happened in a 3-hour period. The Utah Jazz walked off the court, the NBA postponed the season, Tom Hanks announced he had COVID, and Sarah Palin was revealed as the masked singer. If there ever was a harbinger for the remainder of 2020, this day was it. This was also a day after my last trip. I went to our HQ in Alexandria to meet Sara Wallace, who we had just hired to lead our paid media offering. On my trip back home, I received a voicemail saying we had potential exposure to the virus in our office. I felt like Patient Zero in the Charlotte airport and would later say goodnight to my wife and daughters from the bottom of the basement stairs as I self-quarantined for a day until we received an all-clear. It's incredible to think about how little we knew about the virus back then. As I look back now, it's amazing to see how far our work — and yours — has come this year. And all while doing it virtually, which gives me so much hope for how much better the work will be when we all get back to campus.  Ah, January. Full of hope you were. Big plans we had. So much so a couple of us scheduled our most ambitious campus visit trip ever. We'd hit six campuses across two universities in five days and conduct more than 35 in-person interviews from Seattle to San Francisco. We saw higher education the way I wish our country could see higher education: Experiencing a top-ranked public flagship with more impactful reach and scale than I've ever seen and a private institution committed so deeply across its three campuses to the arts, sciences, and the diversity of its own community. This trip was perfect. Almost too perfect in that it ended in San Francisco (a city to which I had never been and where I spent a lot of time looking at Alcatraz wondering why we haven't gotten a prequel to The Rock) with a beer with a former co-worker who is one of the really good people in this world.  Which brings us back to today, moving forward again. 2021 will have its challenges and its pain, no doubt. But looking back, it's evident we are closer to January 2020 than we are far from it. This much closer to being on campus again. To applying the lessons we learned this year. To experiencing one another. And that gives me hope.  Much love to you and yours this season.