To stand out in a competitive digital space, universities need to craft authentic and impactful content that resonates with their audiences across channels. However, without optimised content delivery, well-crafted content cannot make the impact it deserves. During a Times Higher Education webinar, held in partnership with Canto, experts discussed how universities can optimise their digital content delivery to enhance engagement and strengthen their brand presence.
“From a higher education point of view, digital storytelling is about creating interactive stories that would make the audience engage with you, relate to you and give you that human connection through a digital format,” said Poonam Maini, marketing manager at Cranfield University.
“There is so much content out there, it is difficult to capture attention,” said Lizzie Ellen, senior communications manager for the Faculty of Natural, Mathematical and Engineering Sciences at King’s College London. “Universities need to be more daring in our storytelling and not just reel out the same old templates and approaches to sharing research or student experience.” Experimenting with various styles and formats can help institutions find what resonates with their audience, Ellen added.
“We want our students to leave feeling like they are prepared for industry,” said Lucy Ward, senior marketing communications officer at Arts University Plymouth. “Any projects – whether they are personal or professional – that can show that development in students, that is what we like to focus on in our storytelling.”
Digital asset management is a key resource for universities looking to amplify storytelling and scale brand identity, said Roxanne Lewington, growth marketing manager at Canto.
The lack of time and resources is a common challenge in higher education marketing. For example, the University of Wyoming in the US manages over 200 design projects every year. To streamline their delivery, it used Canto to consolidate around 15,000 assets into a centralised, searchable library. This made it easier for different teams to find on-brand assets and curate content for different audiences. “That saves a lot of time. You can surface assets easily and make it easy to resize and reutilise,” Lewington said.
It is crucial to be mindful of aspects such as rights, consent and security when capturing and storing videos and images, Lewington noted. With centralised libraries and digital asset management tools, you can add approval and expiry dates, record digital rights and watermark assets, ultimately safeguarding your brand.
“We work with 25 partner groups around the world, which means we have quite a large number of people who are accessing our digital assets,” said Ellen Summey, DHIS2 communications advisor at the University of Oslo. “Bottlenecks tend to occur when we are collaborating with some of our partners. It can be difficult to coordinate approvals,” Summey added. “We use Canto, and each of these partner groups is able to have its own portal. They can upload and manage digital assets and talk a little about digital rights and access.”
Another challenge is the siloes that exist within universities. It is important to collaborate with different departments to bring out the best within an institution, said Maini. “What is happening now is we are looking at collaborating as an entire university more and everybody coming together with their ideas in one pot.”
The panel:
- Lizzie Ellen, senior communications manager, Faculty of Natural, Mathematical and Engineering Sciences, King’s College London
- Roxanne Lewington, growth marketing manager, Canto
- Poonam Maini, marketing manager, Cranfield University
- Ellen Summey, DHIS2 communications advisor, University of Oslo
- Sreethu Sajeev, branded content deputy editor, Times Higher Education (chair)
- Lucy Ward, senior marketing communications officer, Arts University Plymouth
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