Concordia University Irvine — like its peer institutions — was struggling to stand out in the marketplace due to rising competition and declining demand.

Locally, the private Christian university was regarded as “Irvineʼs best kept secret,” a little-known regional institution that was occasionally confused with UCI. Beyond Orange County, there was minimal brand awareness. And Concordia’s brand was complicated, and, as a result, was diluted. However, the institution has a strong base — students, alumni, faculty, staff, and members of the Irvine community — that believes in its mission and supports its university wholeheartedly.

Beginning in Summer 2021, we partnered with Concordia to lead a comprehensive brand project designed to elevate, celebrate and grow the storied university. I served as lead copywriter, creative director, and brand strategist.

The yearlong project included:

-Qualitative and quantitative brand research

-Refined brand strategy

-New brand and athletic identity

-Brand campaign concepting

-Weeklong production across Orange County

-Web redesign

-Ad campaign launch with hundreds of ads across paid social, paid search, CTV, and OOH

The brand campaign, “Freedom to Explore,” highlights the extraordinary Concordia community and shows how a private Christian education is not only high quality but by design — personally, professionally, and spiritually. The campaign was the most awarded campaign across higher education in 2022 and has led to demonstrable growth for the institution:

-Increased in inquiries by 37%

-Increased .edu inquiries by 25%

-Increased App Submit by 21%

-Most awarded higher ed campaign at the 2022 Education Advertising Awards (EdADAwards): Best in Show, Gold: Total Digital Marketing Campaign, Gold: Total Athletic Marketing Campaign, Gold: Website Refresh, Gold: Streaming/On Demand Content, Gold: Logo/Letterhead Design, Gold: Facebook Content, Gold: Advertising Industry Self-Promotion Out-of-Home, Gold: Magazine Advertising-Single,Silver: Digital Video Ad-Less than 2 Minutes, Silver: Television Advertising-Single, Silver: Total Recruitment Package, Bronze: Integrated Marketing Campaign, Bronze: Total Advertising Campaign, Bronze: Outdoor

In Spring 2023, the University of Arizona Global Campus partnered with our agency to lead the institution through a comprehensive brand development project. The culmination of that work is “Proud to Be UAGC,” a creative campaign that embodies the spirit of the UAGC community and the new brand positioning of the institution. I served as lead copywriter, creative director, and brand strategist.

The goal of “Proud to Be UAGC” was to evoke a sense of pride of being part of UAGC and the University of Arizona community — and the pride that comes with achieving personal, professional, and educational goals.

This project involved:

-In-depth brand research and focus groups

-Brand strategy development

-Brand campaign concepting

-Casting real UAGC graduates

-3-day video and photo production with a crew of over 60 people who helped us capture content at Commencement and at home and office locations

-Execution of the Commencement Welcome Experience, an on-site event featuring photo booths, 360-degree camera booths, and more

-Post-production of hundreds of paid social and paid search assets, including CTV and OOH

In the 3-month period after launch, the Proud to Be UAGC campaign improved overall campaign CTR by +77% and CVR +47% even at a lower spend (Meta excluded from overall summary metrics due to delay in creative launch).

Channel Results:

YouTube: +390% in CTR, -51% drop in cost, -74% in Impressions, +28 in clicks

Display: -17% in CTR, -8% drop in cost, +23% in impressions, +42% in CVR

Discovery: -9% in CTR, -60% drop in cost, -21% in impressions, +11% in CVR

Meta: +397% in CTR, -8% drop in cost, -71% in impressions, -37% CPC

Launched in August 2020, the Emmy Award-winning National University “Home” campaign honors the brave men and women who build, serve, and support our communities and call National University home. From teachers and nurses to business leaders and first responders, our students and alumni strive to make an impact in the lives of those around them each and every day. The goal of this campaign is to celebrate these everyday heroes and announce NU’s $30 million investment in student scholarships, an initiative designed to make higher education more affordable for hard-working adults!

I served as associate creative director of copy for this campaign, leading a team of talented creatives during concept brainstorms, managing the casting process (all real students and alumni!), and overseeing and contributing to copy development. In addition, I led the pre-production process, including building out storyboards, creating shot lists, and collaborating with our production partners.

During production, I traveled with our crew to Wilmington, North Carolina, and throughout Utah to capture beautiful photography and footage for our commercials. I provided on-set creative direction, assisted with wardrobe selection, and helped wrangle our amazing cast!

After the shoot, we worked super hard over three weeks to produce hundreds of paid social ads, videos, billboards, bus wraps, transit signs, web pages, and more. In the end, we created a meaningful, heart-felt campaign that I’m so proud to have been a part of.

The concept for our #My30 campaign was born out of a desire to capitalize on the prior year’s rebrand of National University and a long, over-caffeinated concept session with my creative partner Alicia Rousseau. Our goal was to highlight the multi-faceted lives of our students and alumni while communicating our most valuable value prop: one-month classes. I led copy development, while my partner led design.

Once we received approval to develop the campaign, I developed a casting survey that went out to 90,000 students and alumni to ask if they wanted to be part of our marketing campaign. I then read over 1,000 submissions and selected 150 students and alumni to interview. From there, I narrowed down the “cast” to 30 students and alumni, who we filmed during a 30-day production shoot around the country.

During our shoot, I was provided creative direction on set, learned the complexities of commercial shoots, met some of our amazing students and alumni, and worked with incredibly talented crews.

After our shoot, my creative team and I built out campaign assets, such as paid social ads, digital videos, print ads, event collateral, and more. I also developed the two :30 broadcast scripts and digital video script, with the :30 Anthem spot earning us three Emmy nominations, including one for Short Form Writing — a career highlight!

City University of Seattle needed a fresh, new look, so in January 2019, my design partner and I tackled concepting for a rebrand. The client wanted to showcase the supportive CityU student and alumni community and showcase their home, the city of Seattle.

In the 11th hour of concepting, we came up with a line that we knew would resonate with our client: A City Where You Achieve. From there, I developed the messaging hierarchy, value prop messaging, and pitch deck copy. And the client loved it!

Once we received approval, I began casting for the photo and video shoot, interviewing hundreds of students and alumni and culling down the cast to about 20 students. From there, I build a shot list and pre-pro deck and collaborated with our external production team to bring our campaign to life.

During the April production shoot, I provided on-set creative direction. After the shoot, I wrote, edited, and managed development of all campaign assets, from website content, paid social ads, print materials, and digital videos.

Rebranding National University was my first major campaign for National University System in 2017.

Our goal was differentiate NU from our competitors and take back market share in the overcrowded marketplace by positioning its four-week class structure as the most accessible, achievable way for prospective students to earn a degree and change their lives, one 30-day class at a time.

Creatively, my main focus was to strip out the lofty, flowery language of the previous brand and focus on communicating our main value props and using simple, straightforward, and action-oriented language. I also wanted to feature real students and alumni instead of stock photos or models/actors in order to make the brand real, relatable, and reputable.

For this campaign, I led copy development for all assets, which included web, digital, broadcast, social, print, and out of home. I also managed the casting process by emailing 90,000 students and alumni, interviewing 180, and selecting 30 final cast members.

Major League Soccer goalkeeper Tim Howard became an SNHU online student in January 2017. I served as copywriter on all campaign elements, including broadcast, print and digital banner ads.

As the official education partner of Major League Soccer, SNHU supports MLS soccer players and staff in pursuing their online education. To promote our partnership and reach avid soccer fans, I concept and write various marketing pieces, including broadcast spots, radio, in-stadium signage and print ads.

In Spring 2015, I rewrote and reoptimized approximately 600 landing pages, program pages and category pages for the SNHU Redesign project. It was a huge undertaking, but I really enjoyed just putting my head down and busting out these pages quickly and accurately, streamlining the process and collaborating with our web, marketing and digital teams. The site ultimately launched July 2015.

"Dear Excuses" was a social media and digital campaign for Fall 2016. I concepted and wrote copy for the campaign assets, including digital video, bumper ads, organic and paid social media, banner ads and print ads.