1. 5 Things That speaking with 600+ students taught us about marketing on college campuses
I spent the last year meeting with 160 clubs and organization leaders, surveying over 600
students, and meeting with faculty advisors and department leads across the Bay Area to
understand how students want to receive content.
We started our journey by building an app that would customize on-campus organization and
event marketing based on a student’s interest to boost student engagement. Students loved
the idea because over 3/4ths of them felt that they were missing out on events because they
didn’t know what was going on around them. Faculty and staff liked the idea because they
know how deeply being involved with clubs and organizations in college benefits a student.
But there was one minor disconnect. Faculty, staff and organization members put forth
extreme efforts to advertise on campus. Why then, with interested students, did some
organizations thrive, while others went unnoticed. The lessons we learned can help your
business gain traction on college campuses.
1. Marketing to the masses only benefits large or established brands
Clubs and organizations are like companies. Large, established clubs have brand
recognition have brand recognition on campus, where new clubs need to be more agile
in their marketing. Let’s say there were two hiking clubs on campus – ‘Club Outdoors’
and ‘Club Wild’. If Club Outdoors had been around for 20 years and had 100 members,
they could table on campus, put up flyers or posters, advertise on campus media
channels, send emails, or have everyone in the club post something about an upcoming
event on social media or have their group ambassadors spread the word.
If Club Wild was started earlier in the year and only had 6 devoted members, they
couldn’t advertise in the same way. They would go largely unnoticed. Their reach is
smaller, they have less people who know about them, and thus are easier to ignore or
dismiss. Even if someone did hear about one of Wild’s events they may pass on the
opportunity without giving it a chance because “I can go to Outdoors similar event later
in the month. My friends are going to that, anyways.”
If you are new to the market or to a campus, you can’t advertise like the big, established
Outdoors. You need to key in on a very specific segment of the campus. The smaller the
focus the better. Establish strong relationships with them and make sure they love you
enough to tell their friends to leave the Outdoors and jump into the Wild!
2. Students ignore tabling, fliers, cork boards
73% of our surveyed students did not read advertisements on display TV’s, 66% do not
look at cork boards or fliers. And tabling? Students have places to be and are typically
walking with their head in their phone – often purposely. They don’t want to stop and

2. chat. Even if students did respond to these form of marketing, most campuses do not
allow products or non-student entities to advertise on campus without having a
formalized partnership with the University.
If you are a startup, you understand that our schedules operate on a week-to-week,
day-to-day, or even hour-to-hour basis. Administrations look long term. Their schedules
move on a quarter, semester or even a year-long timeline, so if you need to establish a
partnership with them in order to advertise on campus, you may be waiting longer than
you can afford.
So what can you do? Leverage the greater university community. Partner with popular
student-hotspots and vendors, partner with clubs or organizations, partner with
targeted students that will stand to benefit the most through your product or service.
Then incentivize!
3. Students want customization
Popular apps and platforms today are customizing their products so that it serves the
needs of the user and does not clutter their experience with information or functions
they do not care about.
70% of our surveyed students ignore mass emails sent by the university departments
because they feel that most of the emails, “don’t pertain to me.” If you want to grow,
get to know your target customers.
Understand their priorities and behaviors, then customize your content, campaigns
and/or incentives to fit them.
4. Students do not want tochange their current habits or comply strictly to systems put
in place by administrations
Students and faculty think differently. They have different schedules, habits, and are at
different stages in their lives. Students are also much more in touch with the latest tech
trends and platforms.
90% of student organizations use Facebook for club communications. Many others use
tools like Slack or Google Suite. If a University invests in a new communication tool and
requires its use, students may begrudgingly adopt it with minimal use, but they will
continue using what they like as their go-to-tool.
If you want student buy-in. Start with the students. Allow them to make their own
decisions. If they like what you have to offer, they will share it with their friends. Then
you can go to the University with evidence of demand for your product or service.

3. 5. Students want to be involved in what is perceived as cool
Santa Clara University organization president Mac McOsker said, “Students support
what they create. They don’t want to go to events that other are not going to.” 89% of
students trust the recommendations of their friends and family more than claims made
by brands.
Students want to be heard. They want to be part of the process. Show them what you
have to offer, let them decide how or why their friends should be a part of it. Light the
spark and then get out of their way, they’ll make it cool!