DU making a difference

Over the last several weeks, I’ve been introducing the For the Difference Campaign and sharing updates on the rollout, including the work currently underway to develop a robust visual identity system and review our logo marks. Our ability to offer a student experience that spans urban and mountain environments underscores the fact that our location in Colorado is one of our strongest selling points, along with our offerings that allow students to learn about global communities, influence communities, and experience a four-dimensional education. We will be infusing the newly announced Kennedy Mountain Campus at the University of Denver and reinforcing all of DU’s unique value propositions into our marketing efforts moving forward to celebrate this acquisition and further differentiate our experience from those offered by our competitors.

Since the campaign launched this summer, you may have seen some of our ads—digital, out of home, broadcast, social—in Denver or one of the other targeted markets—Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, or Portland. Soon prospective students may notice digital display ads featuring Spanish language that will be incorporated into our optimization efforts to extend our reach and connect with new audiences.

Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been able to catch a glimpse of some of our transit ads on the light rail—one evening at the 25^th/Broadway Station while traveling to the Nuggets season opener and one morning on my way to campus near the Mineral Station on Santa Fe Drive. It’s exciting to see DU’s brand show up in the market and equally thrilling to know this is in tandem with our commercial being broadcast during DU hockey games this season on Altitude Sports, the same channel that carries Denver Nuggets, Colorado Avalanche, and Colorado Rapids games, as well as on streaming television (OTT).

Our goals of the For the Difference campaign remain to:

1. Increase DU’s top-of-mind awareness and perception
2. Build audience affinity and preference for DU
3. Enhance DU’s pipeline for new leads, conversions, and brand ambassadors

Each of these goals supports the University’s Five Strategic Imperatives, and specifically we aim to do our part to “Ensure a bold, sustainable future for the next generation through our financial, reputational, and operational practices.”

The team and I are pleased to have the opportunity to introduce to some and reinforce to others the value of DU and the impact of an experience that will enable students to not only envision a better world but also become equipped to make it a reality.