Bridging the Gap: Authentic Marketing and Enrollment in Higher Education

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Episode Transcript

[Music Intro]

Brian Trainer, Host: Welcome to Trends + Tensions in Architecture and Design, presented by BHDP, where we discuss Trends in Architectural and Interior design and the competing priorities or Tensions that arise from integrating new ideas into existing organizations, enterprises, and institutions. In this episode, “Bridging the Gap: Authentic Marketing and Enrollment in Higher Education,” we are joined by Bart Caylor, President and Founder of Caylor Solutions and the Higher Ed Marketer, David Burke, President of Legacy Higher Education, along with Paul Orban, Managing Partner at BHDP. I am your host, Brian Trainer, senior strategist for BHDP. Let’s get started.

Today, we're discussing bridging the gap, authentic marketing, and enrollment in higher education. We have a couple of guests with us. Please tell us who you are and what you do. 

Bart Caylor: Yeah, thanks, Brian. I'm Bart Caylor. I'm the president and founder of Caylor Solutions and the Higher Ed Marketer. I do a lot of education marketing, so we do everything from strategy to tactical. So, everything from comm flows for enrollment to websites, to capital campaigns for advancement. We are there to help with marketing and comms. And so I've got a team of about 45 people based out of Indianapolis and exclusively work with higher ed. 

Brian: Fantastic. Thank you, Bart. Dave? 

Dave Burke: Yeah. My name is Dave Burke, and I'm the president of Legacy Higher Education. I focus on enrollment strategies and structures, and raising all the ships to get more students to your institutions. So, we focus on everything from assessment work to team trainings, coaching enrollment leaders, and enrollment research, and we just stand ready to help.

Brian: Thank you, Dave 

Paul Orban: I'm Paul Orban. I'm the market leader for higher education at BHDP. We are campus strategists, planners, designers, architects, and interior designers, working with colleges and universities all over the country to help shape their space and campus with the ultimate goal of attracting and retaining students.

Brian: Thank you, Paul. So, we're talking about bridging that gap between marketing and enrollment. It's great that we have someone representing both of those mediums or lines of thought. So, what does that collaboration between enrollment and marketing look like, especially when we think about the campus experience?

Bart: I'll go ahead and jump in and start the conversation because I think it's different among different campuses. So, historically, marketing came out of advancement because back in the day, the only marketing and communications that they needed to do was to get the alumni magazine out. Many times, enrollment became a catcher's mitt. We just know the kids are gonna come, so we'll just catch them in the mitt. Maybe they do a view book every now and then. But there was no web, there was no email, there was no social media. And the only need that a school really had for what would be considered a marketing team would be an editor, a writer, a graphic designer, and a photographer. That historically came out of advancement. But I would say that over the last 30 years or so, schools are starting to realize that more and more of the revenue is coming through enrollment. Enrollment has become more complicated with all the different omnichannels that we can use to communicate with prospective students and their influencers. The moms and dads or spouses, if they're adult students. It became more important that marketing needed to find a better way to work with enrollment. Some schools made the decision to move marketing from under advancement and put it under enrollment. So, you see a lot of Vice Presidents for Enrollment and Marketing.

Some schools decided to move marketing out from under advancement and put it up at the cabinet level. So there are Chief Marketing Officers or Vice Presidents for Marketing, and so there's a mix across the way. Still, the ones that do the best, the ones that are succeeding right now, are the ones that have really good relationships between marketing and enrollment. Dave and I have worked together a lot on many different projects, and we bring that together as an outside group, along with Legacy and Caylor Solutions. But I know, Dave, you spent a lot of time on campus and have had that experience of what can sometimes be siloed. So why don't you talk about that? 

Dave: Certainly, and like Bart said, it really does look different on campuses, and part of that comes down to staffing and resources, right? And so, some campuses have full-blown ad agencies basically embedded in their campus structure, and others may have one marketing professional or outsource all of their marketing work because they don't have the resources to staff up in terms of their marketing efforts. And like Bart said, whatever structure we're in, being as anti-siloed as possible is so important because they really need to work together to ensure that messaging is consistent and that the enrollment voice is being heard in marketing. And also, as Bart alluded to, we're realizing that a lot of our marketing efforts are aimed at our various prospective student audiences. And so, for instance, where I've seen it work best is when there are dedicated teams, or individuals embedded in the marketing structure that basically serve the enrollment process, right? So, it's not getting drowned out by all of the different requests coming in from faculty or other entities around campus with the little pet projects that tend to spring up on our institutions and our campuses.

So, I think it's really just about consistency of approach, partnership approach, and putting feet on the pavement. As we think about starting to talk a lot about campus experience, I think about things like tour route branding, the website content and layout, the visit collateral, and the trends that are happening with swag. There are many things that marketing can really assist the enrollment office in when it comes to figuring out how best to entertain, host, and put our best foot forward when students come to campus and experience the actual physical space as well. 

Bart: Yeah, and Dave, I'll add one thing to that too, in the sense that a lot of times those schools are siloed, you end up with kind of the brand police on one side who are so focused on walking around, making sure that the logos are being used. As Dave said, it's what I call the institutional Kinkos. I wrote a book called “Chasing Mission Fit” last year, and I discussed the idea that many schools look at their marketing and turn it into Institutional Kinkos, where it's like, "Hey, make this look better by Monday." We need to realize that marketing professionals could bring many more revenue-enhancing activities to bear if we oriented them toward that type of work. Dave, I think you did a great job explaining some of the things that need to happen, and that's just an excellent way of saying that they really have to be together and interlocked.

Paul: What's really interesting about this is that doing what we do shapes that physical experience, right? If things are working well or the right people are in the right place and it's not siloed, we're able to hear a unified message: What are you really trying to sell? What is the message here? What's unique about this campus? And help us understand that so we can help you. Bring that into the physical realm of space and experience. But many times, to your point, part of it is not; it's fragmented. There are different people involved, and we're getting different messages that maybe aren't even aligned, right? So we first have to try to build that consensus and understand, ultimately, what's the goal here? 

Brian: Yeah. It's interesting that most students' first experience with a college is online. There's a digital first touch, as they're doing their research for where they want to go to school. I heard Dave talk about tour route branding, and I was curious, are there other things like that? How does the digital experience translate to the physical environment once people are there? What's working, what's not working? What's that transition into the campus experience? 

Bart: Yeah. I think it starts with authenticity. Research shows us that your website is the number one touch point, the number one marketing element you have as an institution. And if your website has authentic photos, authentic messaging, and authentic things that resonate with the students, it returns to the physical space. So, they're going to see something on the website, and they're going to get excited, whether it's on the website or social media. And there are only three ways students end up at a school. They're either legacy students, so they've been on the campus since they were in diapers. You've also got influencers. Somebody down the street went to that school, or maybe I went to a baseball camp in the summer, and I was on campus for a little bit, and that coach influenced me. And then you got pure discovery, where I had no knowledge about this school, and found the website. Or I clicked on something on social media, went to the website, and thought it was pretty cool. And so that's why I think it's important that we use those digital aspects to really authentically show off who we are and show off that in a very accurate way. Dave, you might have some additional thoughts on that as well. 

Dave: Yeah, no. I think the only other thought that I have is that as we translate the digital to the physical, I think a lot of institutions, especially in the early days of virtual tours, had a fear that the virtual tour would replace the physical tour, and they're going to see us and feel like, okay, I've been there, done that I know what the campus looks like. And I would say that the authenticity and well-done virtual tour inspire a higher degree of physical campus visits. And so, making that, we have that blend of putting our best foot forward but also doing it in an authentic way.

Paul: Bart, Dave, I know you guys are on hundreds of campuses. Are there examples of things where you say, "Wow, that was where we spotted something that just stood out, not authentic, or the other way?" Examples where it's wow, that was done really well, where the virtual and the physical, and marketing, everything was synced up and seamless.

Bart: Yeah. Unfortunately, Paul, it's easier to point out the ones doing it wrong. A good example is that we do a lot of websites, so I'll do a review on a website even before I get on campus. What I see is that people are doing the website in the summer. So, they go out and they take all these pictures, and there are no people to be found anywhere. So, you've got these pictures of buildings, you've got these pictures of libraries that are totally empty. And I would even say, and Paul, you know this, when you even present your renderings, you put people in them because the human touch is gonna not only give context to what's going on, but it's gonna stir emotion. Oh, I can see myself being there. And I think that one of the biggest areas that schools miss out on is when you are representing the physical world of your campus and of your community, use emotion. That's the way that we are wired. We make decisions on emotion, then we back it up with the facts and the data.

So we've got to lean into emotions, which comes down to authentically showing your campus. And it needs to be more authentic than three and a tree. The idea of sticking three students under a tree, laughing with a frisbee flying in the background—people don't want to see that either. I encourage people to look at journalistic-type photography, where you're catching the moment in the background instead of trying to overdo and make something polished. 

Dave: Yeah. And translating to the physical visit. Paul, I think Bart and I, as you mentioned, are on a lot of campuses. We're on a lot of campuses together. We're being hosted on actual tours, and I think one of the things that we see is that almost every campus that we're on has a set tour route. And almost every campus that we're on patently fails to maximize its branding opportunities. Throughout the tour route, there are so many blank spaces. There are so many places that we're on around campus that are like, man, they could be really selling themselves in this way, and pay more attention to how they market. They tell their story right throughout the tour, not just through the tour guide's voice, but through what they're interacting with. There are definitely a couple of places that we've been that do it better than others. That's one big point of a gap that we see in a lot of places. 

Brian: When you talk about the physical environment and do those tour routes, you build these first impressions. And I always think about the people who live in New York who never go to the Statue of Liberty. How do you build the first impression, but then what happens to it over the life cycle of a student? How do you make those things fresh and interesting and something new for people on campus? 

Dave: Let me jump in real quick with the very, very first impression that I want to hear Bart's perspective on, blowing it out a little bit wider. The welcome experience as students come onto your campus for the first time is so critical and often paid so little attention to compared to the other things that happen. And I always like to say make the most of wherever you're situated, a lot of people are not really happy about where their welcome experience is or whatnot, but maximize it while you're looking for other opportunities to grow. Really overdo the red carpet treatment. This is sometimes your only chance to have this person on your campus. And so if we're not showing great hospitality and making sure that people feel welcome, cared for, comfortable, and really valued as soon as they walk into the place, we've missed an opportunity for that. You never get a second chance to make a first impression. And so I know that's just a very small microcosm of what you're asking, Brian, but I feel like that's something that's often overlooked in the campuses that we're at. 

Bart: If you're a VP for Enrollment, your best friends need to be marketing, physical plant, and others who are gonna help you with that red carpet. You should have a sign and a dedicated parking spot with the welcome sign that has the student's name on their parking spot when you pull up. That's a simple, easy thing that you can do. There are tools out there that you can use for that. Paul will be happy to point you in the right direction on that, and you've gotta make sure that when they pull up, everything is mowed there. There are no cracks in the sidewalk going up. Every school has deferred maintenance. We get that. Make sure that your deferred maintenance is not the welcome center in the parking lot, because you have to make sure that it is the million-dollar walk coming in.

And so, really trying to make sure that everything that you do from that first point, as well as when you do the campus tour, there are places that are amazing to show. I was on a tour once when Dave, you, and I were on the same tour. We're walking through the nursing area. They're like, we have these amazing, $2 million sims in there, but they have class, so we can't show 'em. And they just wanted to walk away. And I was like, why don't we have a QR code on the outside that plays a video to see the amazing lab work stuff in there? If you're spending money on the physical space, make sure you have ways to show it off, even if a class is going on. And so, there are all kinds of things like that. And by all means, don't take them through the worst part of campus to get to another part of campus. Get yourself a cart or skip that part of campus, and have a video somewhere you'll show. Because the last thing you need to do is trudge five minutes through the worst part of town to see something for another five minutes. Paul, you probably have a lot more to say about that stuff. I agree with all that. 

Paul: All good stuff. I think there's a value to a fresh set of eyes when you look at these tours, and when each of us goes and audits these tours, different things that the people so close to the campus just look past every day, right? Whether it's that crack in the sidewalk, unkept landscaping, or something that may not make this the best experience possible. I also think that a fresh set of eyes is really helpful to say what your assets are that are really gonna help sell this place, but also help make you memorable. So many campuses we walk on have amazing features, whether it's an outdoor space with a great sense of place where people can imagine being, or a beautiful building, or a space in a building, a chapel, or something like that. And some of those aren't even included in the tours. Or if they are, they're maybe an afterthought or not strategically placed where it's wow, that's a really memorable thing that someone's gonna point to when they compare this to many other tours they've been on. So, it's that fresh set of eyes to help you see what you're not seeing, whether it's deferred maintenance improvements, or the assets you have that you're not leveraging. 

Brian: We talk about building that first impression, so that's as far as enrollment goes, that's the attraction part of it. What about the retention component? How do you create that experience and keep it going so that people, once they're there, want to stay for years and years?

Bart: Yeah, and I think that goes back to some other stuff that we've alluded to a little bit: authenticity still has to be there. Students talk and expect, so if you have some things that are just overly problematic and are not addressing those things, they just become friction for the students. I talk a lot about friction in my book, and everything I do is that every time, whether it's from the top of the funnel that we're starting to create marketing, anytime that you create friction, where a student says, “I don't think I want to do this anymore.” A study done a couple of years ago showed that a goldfish has a better attention span than a 17-year-old. And so, like a goldfish is eight seconds, a 17-year-old is six seconds. So, if you create friction where they suddenly have a reason to say, I don't know if I wanna do this, they're gonna bail.

And so if you give them friction enough days in a row that deferred maintenance says, I don't know if I wanna come back second semester, they're gonna transfer. If you give them friction that says, hey, I'm not sure that getting signed up for classes next semester is easy, or they make it so hard, I have to go to the financial aid office to sign off on my financial aid, and I already have social anxiety because of COVID. And so, you have to figure out ways, whether it's your physical space, your processes, or the things you're doing on campus. You have to focus on customer service first. We are businesses. There are gonna be a lot of people who don't like to hear that, but at the end of the day, we need to look at things from a P&L statement. We need to look at things from the perspective that we spend a lot of money on customer acquisition. We need to spend a lot to keep them on campus.

Dave: Yeah. I'll just add a very quick exclamation mark that the customer service equals a lot of listening, not assuming. And so, some campuses do an excellent job of listening and paying attention to what their students say. And some that kind of bury their heads in the sand. If we can't hear it, it's not happening. So, when you talk about retention, Brian, in that regard, that's probably the prime issue for me, which is listening and paying attention to our student body.

Brian: When we talk about the campus experience, how does marketing assist with that? What's marketing's role in the campus experience? 

Bart: I think the day-to-day is helping enrollment understand what is out there and what could be done. I was on a campus tour with my son. He went to the University of Cincinnati. And one of the things that I noticed on the tour day was that it was a big visit day. There are probably a couple of hundred students there with their families. We got there early, and as I sat there, I tapped my toes. “Oh, that's a Hall and Oates song. I haven't heard that song since the eighties. That's cool,” and the next song was Post Malone. And my son said, "Hey, I like this song, dad.” The next song was Michael Jackson. The next song was by Taylor Swift, and I thought they created a playlist for mom and dad, and then one for the students. I was like, that's brilliant. So, I returned to ChatGPT and said, “I want to create a playlist”. I explained what I was doing and said, “I want you to be a DJ. I want it to be for a visit day. I want it to be 150 beats per minute or higher, and plan it out.” And it planned it out. It gave me exactly the songs I needed to use. It gave me instructions on how to import that into Spotify. Now, enrollment might not know that. They are like, we're just going to have it, and so you miss the opportunities. 

Another thing that we've done is to get a new campus tour route. We uploaded the campus map to ChatGPT. We uploaded the branding guidelines and messaging guidelines to ChatGPT to tell us where to take the tour and what places to start. It can read maps. We did it for another school. We uploaded elevation maps from the US government. Now it told us, "We'll avoid that place 'cause there's a hill, we're gonna take this way.” So, there are a lot of ways that you can use generative AI. There are a lot of ways that you can do marketing. There are many places to put messaging, whether it's QR codes or a self-guided tour that happens on the weekends when nobody's around with QR codes to scan. And when they scan, they have to register. We still get the campus lead because a lot of people are driving through town over the weekend on vacation, and they'll stop by and take a tour on their own. We also want to find ways to capture those leads when the admissions office is closed. Those are some ideas that we're working on with enrollment teams. Dave, I know you've probably got many ideas on how you've used marketing before as well. 

Dave: Just one more in that regard for me is that Bart was obviously talking about how important the website is, and I spend a lot of time talking to campus clients about when it comes to the campus experience and prospective student visits, leading the horse to the water that we want them to drink.
So many of us just take a passive stance: Hey, we know you're gonna come take a tour. Here are some other things you can do if you want, rather than laying out sample agendas, opting out versus opting into certain things. So, marketing can jump in and help by laying out content, word choice, and vernacular. That really drives decision-making and ensures that the campus experiences of our prospective students are maximized across the board as much as possible. We're never going to bat a thousand on getting everybody to come to campus for a six—or eight-hour visit. But we certainly want to lead them more toward what some of them have just been taught: going toward the campus, the campuses you're interested in. So, the website has some awesome opportunities, even during the registration and decision process, to lead that forward. Marketing can be an excellent partner in that regard, for sure.

Brian: Dave, you talked about leading people to the experiences that you want them to have. Have you noticed over time what experiences matter most to potential candidates? What are they drawn to? 

Dave: Yeah, so that's such a good question, Brian. And at the risk of alienating my architecture friends on the podcast, it's interesting. I do a lot of admitted student research. We ask about the most positive impressions from the campus visit and look to see what activities during the campus visit translate into enrollment. And you can probably guess this: Overall, first impressions are big. Do I like the environment? Yeah. The next two after that, in terms of what they always say is the most positive impression, are community and friendliness. When we translate it into the research of the types of engagements they have on campus, the more they are connected with current students, faculty members, and people outside the admissions office, the more that leads towards enrollment behavior. 

What they want to see is an authentic representation of what the campus has to offer in a normal campus setting. And so, what the students, I think, are craving is seeing how this place looks in full action. And so even overnight visits, which went away during COVID, are creeping back a little bit, can be such a powerful and compelling opportunity if your state doesn't have 3000 different obstacles, legal obstacles towards hosting students overnight. But those are the types of things that I think really grab the students' attention. And it does involve the campus environment for sure, but a lot of it is about engagement. Every single client that does our admitted student research, we ask the students and the parents, when you think about academic reputation, how are you filtering that? What kind of information? How are you getting that information? The number one answer is always a campus visit. So, many of our campuses need to show friendly faces and great buildings, and show off, but let's make sure that the academic message is out there strongly as well. And that comes down to the spaces, the facilities, the technology. But it also comes down to what you're talking about, Brian. How will this place nurture my academic curiosities and interests and engage me during my time there? So that's a perfect example.

Paul: I think it's a really interesting time when you look at this. I was talking with another president of a residential liberal arts school lately, and she was talking about their need to attract different student profiles because they're in a rural area, and they know that the traditional student numbers aren't going to be there to sustain their enrollment. So, looking at how we attract returning students later in life, people coming to take one class, people retraining for jobs, and knowing that they're looking for different things when they visit campus. They're not looking for three students and a tree with a frisbee, they're looking for, where's my return on investment here? How soon can I see this report in my career? How easy can I get in after work, take a class, and get back out and get home? I have other responsibilities. So, it's back to that whole understanding of the audience and how we tailor that message.

Brian: AI is pretty much interwoven into our daily life at this point. How do you maintain authenticity, and what does it look like for the campus experience? How does that translate to the physical environment? 

Bart: I'll give you my prediction: Within the next three years, our world is going to become so saturated with AI and the artificial part of AI that students and families are going to be seeking out the four-year traditional campus experience in ways they never have before. So many people have been talking about how we're moving online, we're doing this, and I think they've focused so much on that, or they've been focused so much on, we gotta really sell our academic rigor. We've gotta sell this and that. The most valuable asset that especially small private schools are going to have going forward is going to be an authentic residential experience.

Mom and Dad are going to be like, "I want that for my children." Grandma and grandpa are going to be like, "I want that for my grandchildren, what I had." Because in this artificial world, who knows what's real? I know that if I can get them on that campus, and they can have that experience that I had, and they can voluntarily turn off their tech and enjoy life with other people who share that, that is going to be in demand. And liberal arts education is gonna be in demand. And so, a lot of what these schools that I work with are like, “how do we keep up with the other ones”? I'm like, your time's coming 'cause you're gonna be the ones that they're gonna try to emulate. And so, I have real hope for many small private schools going forward because you have authenticity and community, as Dave talked about earlier. You have that in spades. You have that experiential, location. Gen Z and Gen Alpha want; they crave it so much because if you think about Gen Alpha, they have spent a quarter of their life sometimes behind a mask doing school from home. If you look at a year and a half or two years of COVID, a 10-year-old or a 12-year-old, that’s a big chunk of their life. And they're like, “man, I like being able to hang out with people. I like being able to hang out with two other friends under a tree.” They might want that, and that's what we need to be able to show and to sell as opposed to just trying to keep up with what we've always done. So, we have to be nimble and agile and pivot when the opportunity comes.

Brian: What are you looking forward to in the future? 

Dave: Certainly, robot tour guides, of course, right? We're gonna have artificial intelligence woven into our tour guides. And this is an interesting question to think about. As I think about the future, you automatically think technology, right? We know how fast things are increasing from a technological standpoint. Therefore, I think the interactivity of virtual tour experiences can grow further. Versus just watching something online, really interacting online, that really draws the students in and really, again, hopefully paves the way for them to wanna really experience the authentic, physical campus visit. Interactive outcomes for media in the admissions area, the enrollment area, and on the tour route are only going to grow. Bart mentioned our codes. Those things are just going to get more and more advanced, exciting, and interactive as we come through. As Bart said, I hope that it doesn't replace but enhances the kind of real connected pieces we do when students visit.

Bart: Some of the predictions that I think are gonna happen are that it's gonna be around a lot of what we've talked about already, the schools that are doing authenticity. The schools that are communicating well, the schools that are doing marketing and enrollment really tightly, those are the ones that are succeeding right now. The strong are going to get stronger. The ones who are not doing that, who still see marketing sitting underneath advancement, and they always butt heads with enrollment and too busy working on the institutional Kinko stuff, they're getting weaker and they are going to continue to get weaker. We've got way too many headwinds right now, whether it's things like the enrollment cliff or the search cliff where you can't buy names anymore, whether it's just Generative AI, there are a ton of headwinds for higher ed, and if you are a president or a leader listening to this, you need to figure it out and you need to understand more about what's going on under your purview. 

Get some answers and start figuring it out. And sometimes it requires bringing in people like Dave from the outside, or bringing in Paul, or bringing in me to help you sort some things out, 'cause I see way too many people spend a thousand dollars on a keyword. Does that seem right to you? No, it doesn't. And it's things like that we need to figure out, and we need to have leaders who can understand what they are managing, more than just blindly trusting everybody to do things. We don't have the luxury of just being able to sit back and set it and forget it anymore. We've gotta have critical thinking at the top. 

Brian: What advice or recommendations would either of you have for listeners? So, if somebody is a leader at an institution, maybe this is something they're struggling with, where would you tell 'em to start? 

Dave: I would say, especially for campus leaders, evaluating the partnership level of your marketing and enrollment teams is pretty key and a lot of campuses, I think Bart may have mentioned this earlier, they actually have a cabinet level member that is over both of those things, which from an enrollment perspective is effective, especially if they have a level of enrollment expertise or have somebody underneath them. So, how does a structure look? Are we maximizing the opportunity for us to tell our story to prospective student audiences, especially through that relationship and through that collaborative spirit? Step number one is probably to take a looking glass microscope to that dynamic and see how it's going. 

Bart: We don't know what we don't know. We have blind spots. So, as a leader, you have blind spots, whether you want to admit it or not, you do. I think that you need to have some courage to say, “I don't know what I don't know,” and be okay with that, and talk to people who can help you figure it out. But just being brutally honest and courageous to be able to say, “I gotta figure this out because we've been doing the same thing and nothing's changing and I keep asking the same questions and nothing's changing.” Maybe it's not the right question. And so, finding somebody, call Dave up. He'll be happy to come in and talk to you about enrollment, take an assessment, do an audit, look at it, figure it out, and help you with that. Call Paul. He'll help you figure it out or tell you, “Hey, here are some people who can help you.” He's connected across the board. Call me if you want me to take a look at some of the marketing and how you might be able to use AI in different ways.

So just be okay and admit that I don't know what I don't know and ask for some help. I finally learned how to do that as a leader, and it's changed my business. But you gotta realize that you have strengths in some places. Lean into that, do that, but in some places, you don't, and you're going to need help.

Paul: Just to echo Bart, it's that fresh set of eyes that I talked about earlier, right? And that could be calling one of us and sitting down to look at things, or coming out and taking a campus walk. What do you see that I'm not seeing right now? What is your first impression? Then, that begins the ball rolling of what can be some very strategic but not necessarily expensive investments to move the needle and make improvements. A lot of the things that we see out there, at least on the physical side, are not like, “Hey, you need to go build a new building right there because this doesn't look good.” It's, “hey, let's fix this deferred maintenance item, or let's put a graphic or a piece of signage or screen on something that may not be the right experience, or even just avoid that altogether.” These are not expensive things to do. Sometimes, it just takes that fresh, strategic eye that knows how to leverage the right experts to help you tie everything together, to Bart's point. 

Brian: We covered a lot pretty efficiently, which is amazing. You both are excellent. Paul, Dave, and Bart, thank you for joining us and lending your expertise today. I hope you had a good time!

Dave: My Pleasure. 

Paul: Absolutely!

Bart: Great, thank you.

[Music Outro]

Brain Trainer, Host: Thank you for joining Trends + Tensions in Architecture and Design, presented by BHDP, for this episode, “Bridging the Gap: Authentic Marketing and Enrollment in Higher Education,” with Bart Caylor of Caylor Solutions and the Higher Ed Marketer, David Burke of Legacy Higher Education, and Paul Orban of BHDP. If you appreciate what you have heard, please rate, subscribe, and give us a review. I am Brian Trainer, your host, and I hope you’ll join us for another episode of Trends + Tensions to see what topics drive design.