Community College Marketing Master Class

Scott Summerfield is a principal of SAE Communications, an organization that has provided communications counsel, media relations, and Joint Information Center management for many of California's most challenging recent crises, including the 2019 Conception dive boat tragedy, 2017 Thomas fire, and 2014 Isla Vista shootings. In this episode, Scott and Cheryl discuss the challenges of dealing with crisis situations as well as the best practices for handling crisis communications.

Show Notes:

Scott's email: [email protected]

SAE Communications website: saecommunications.com

There are many obstacles that can come between a student and their education, including the ability to drive to class. And even when students aren’t challenged with making the commute to campus, they still have to worry about other things, like whether or not the class they need to graduate is even available. Having an online resource that would connect all of California’s 115 colleges would not only address these challenges specifically, it would improve the overall access to high-quality online courses. In this episode, Andrea Hanstein of the California Virtual Campus – Online Education Initiative (CVC-OEI) and Cheryl Broom, president of Interact, discuss the need for an online education resource and explain how this new initiative works. 

Andrea Hanstein's contact email: [email protected]

Your college community has great stories, but having those stories go beyond your website audience and social network following can be a challenge. So, how exactly do you get your story to make headlines in other publications? In this episode, Anne Krueger, communications and public information director of the Grossmont-Cuyamaca Community College District, and Cheryl Broom, president of Interact, discuss the best ways to market your stories to the media. 

Show Notes:
Link to Annual Report website: https://www.gcccd.edu/about-us-area/annual-report.html

When people become very specialized in their field of study, they can suffer from the curse of knowledge and find it difficult to explain complex subjects. In order to make these subjects more digestible to readers, it's critical that communicators ask the right questions and find the stories within the story. The next step is making those stories understandable and relatable to a larger audience. 

In this episode, Tiffany Fox, director of communications at UC San Diego, and Cheryl Broom, president of Interact Communications, discuss strategies for making stories about complicated topics more accessible for readers. 

New to the conferencing game? No sweat! In this episode, Jeff Ebbing, director of marketing and communications for Southeastern Community College in Iowa, joins Pam Cox-Otto, founder and CEO of Interact Communications, for a discussion on how to make the most of your experience while at conferences. 

Community colleges are structured to respond to community needs, and in order to meet those needs and train students for good-paying careers in the community, colleges must understand the types of industries in their service areas and how likely those industries and local businesses are to hire their students. In addition to this, we also know local business leaders sit on college advisory and foundation boards, donate to scholarships, and lend their expertise in classrooms. So, building strong relationships with these key stakeholders is absolutely essential to the success of colleges. 

In this episode of Interact's Community College Marketing MasterClass, Cheryl Broom of Interact and Scott Ashton of the Oceanside Chamber of Commerce discuss ways to better engage with local businesses and build stronger relationships with them. 

In 2018, Shasta College became one of the emergency shelters during the devastating Carr Fire. The Carr Fire burned more than 225,000 acres and became the sixth-most destructive fire in California, as well as the seventh-largest wildfire recorded in modern California history. In this discussion, president of Interact Communications, Cheryl Broom, and director of marketing and outreach at Shasta College, Peter Griggs, reflect on the disaster and lessons learned in crisis management. 

Director of Public Relations and Marketing at South Texas College, Daniel A. Ramirez, joins Interact Communications Founder and CEO, Pam Cox-Otto for a discussion on using data to build marketing plans and other marketing survival tips. 

Do you ever feel like you’re guessing when it comes to placing your media? Or better yet, does your boss ever tell you to place ads in a channel you know isn’t working? Well, we have good news... each year since 2007, Interact has conducted a national survey on communication preferences and media consumption habits of community college students. We’ve watched how students’ preferences have evolved with the introduction of new media (and we’ve watched some media die off completely). In this discussion, Dr. Pamela Cox-Otto talks about the most recent academic year’s data results and what media you should be looking at this next year.