Did Drake’s Ad Campaign Give Itself a Near-Failing Grade?

Good for them – ‘towing the line’ does not get you recognized. Doing something out of the ordinary will set you apart from the ‘pack’. As professors, we always profess to ‘thinking outside the box’ and that is what they did. Congrats to Office of Admissions for embracing change.

“A near failure?” What metric are you using? If this is a just-launched recruitment campaign, I suggest we reserve the obituary until next fall. Seems to me there’s lots of “judging a book by its cover” going on here. Has anyone taken the time time to read the book? We are in the education business, right?

Since when is unique synonymous with high quality or informative?

Amen, Rick ’52. It’s more than a little scarey when higher education pundits. i.e., “learned persons” immediately dismiss anything new and different (oh no, not INNOVATION)based merely on ” it’s not the way we’ve always done it” or, heaven forbid, flies in the face of “tradition”. To “alundcha” since when has marketing adhered to any measure of “high quality”? All of us baby-boomers running the largest percentage of post-secondary institutional academic and administrative divisions/departments can sing jingles from commercials dating back forty and fifty years! I don’t think any of us would consider little ditties like Brylcreem’s “a little dab’ll do ya” or “Plop, Plop, Fizz, Fizz, oh what a relief it is”, or “double your pleasure, double your fun…” and let’s not forget “I wish I were an Oscar Meyer weiner” even close to the lowest measure of “high quality or informative..”, but, by golly, we can all sing them and probably remember the characters in the commercials! Just like the billboards on highways that say something to the effect of “does billboard advertising work? This one just did”, Drake’s campaign is grabbing the attention of KIDS and most likely, kids’ PARENTS, too. In a time when colleges are actually closing for lack of funds, I’m not prepared to criticize Drake’s or any other post-2nd attempts to bring in students. I plan on watching with interest Drake’s enrollment over the next year….and, BTW, I’D NEVER HEARD OF DRAKE UNTIL THIS ARTICLE ON THIS AD CAMPAIGN!!!!!

The message says to me “we’re somewhat less than satisfactory, but at least we admit it.” Unlike rick1952 (#7), I think the constituency to consider is more likely parents and guidance counselors than students. The question Drake does not seem to have considered is how those folks might react. I doubt they did a market test to find out. My guess is that a brochure with this kind of message is destined for the old round file. It certainly is unlikely to be prominently displayed with those of others.

We need to remember that the target is not academia, nor is it the blogosphere. The target is a 16-year-old high school kid in the Midwest who is likely going to receive viewbooks from every college in Iowa, Illinois, Kansas and Nebraska. Which one of these is that kid going to pick up first, or even notice? Everybody is arguing that this is about Drake’s brand. This is not a branding campaign… it’s a campaign designed to keep an expensive, informative and colorful piece of marketing material from getting thrown in the trash unopened. I bet it’s going to do all that it’s supposed to.

The disconnect is that the image conveyed by the logo doesn’t seem to fit the brand of the school. Drake is something of any Ivy-leaguish university. If they were known for–or aspiring to be–more of a creative, high-energy, risk-taking university I think the logo would fit better. Also critical is that Drake officials didn’t get any input or even give a heads-up to their own faculty and staff. If you’re taking a risk, prepare your number one brand ambassadors–your own employees and students. They may not be the target for the campaign, but they and the alumni can kill it in a heartbeat with lost respect and lost financial contributions. Perhaps adding the “rake” with the Big D would have bridged the gap. Keep the D prominent enough that you get the D+ concept across, but still keep the full name present. Regardless, I give the school a B+ for creativity and risk, a C- for foresight and execution.

I am a former Drake faculty member who accepted a dean’s position elsewhere. As Dean, I was much involved in the rebranding effort on my current campus and learned much about how one markets to target student audiences. Our alumni did not like many things about the changes – who likes change anyway? – but our President reminded them that we were not trying to recruit THEM to come back as undergrads. When I saw the Drake campaign I thought that it made sense and is fully backed up by the brand promise offered therein: your potential plus our opportunities is the Drake advantage. The stylized Drake “D,” which was adopted previously as part of a branding effort, should be recognized as a symbol of Drake, not a symbol of a grade. I do agree with Rick1952 that the faculty at Drake should be asking themselves how they contribute to keeping the promise. I believe my former colleagues remain up to the task.

Bash away, but don’t lose sight of the fact that this campaign (or whatever it is) seems to be doing exactly what effective recruitment marketing efforts are supposed to do: capture attention, stimulate thought and buzz about Drake University (Drake never came up around our kitchen table until last night), driving people to Drake’s website, and causing quite a commotion that will ultimately result in more of the world knowing about Drake University. Those enlightened souls who understand and even enjoy well-executed irony will chuckle and tip their hat to what may end up being a milestone in college marketing history. Those who don’t appreciate irony will write scathing comments like some of the snarky ones above. Come one, people…lighten up. It’s only marketing. And it seems to be working. Hats off to Drake.

Stamats may be reputable, but on my campus the reputation is “There’s seventy grand we’ll never see again.”