Dare Yourself: Notre Dame's New Marketing Campaign

During the summer months most of Notre Dame's hardworking college students were enjoying a much-needed rest whether it be on the sand in Ocean City or waiting on a flight at BWI taking them to their favorite vacation destination. Yet, if they were looking close enough they may have noticed small reminders even then of their home-sweet-home during the summer. These reminders came in the form of ads raising awareness of and drawing attention to the College of Notre Dame. For example, the college opted to bring attention to the school in forms of magazine ads, digital ads on boats, and on the radio station; there were many such reminders of Notre Dame throughout Maryland this summer. These ads were part of a new branding campaign undertaken by the college this year.

Referred to as the 'Dare Yourself' campaign (inspired by Mary Theresa of Jesus Gerhardinger's "Truth and Dare" and mirroring the School Sister's mission), the venture was an opportunity to promote the College during an off-cycle period. During the summer, when most colleges are easing off of such programs, the Dare Yourself campaign helped raised the college's visibility not only for recruiting, but also for fundraising and peer-ranking purposes.

The campaign has several elements that differentiate it from most campaigns. First, instead of simply the call to action (such as attend an information session or visit an open house) that characterizes most campaigns, the Dare Yourself campaign centered on a broader call to action that focused on future goals and aspirations. It promoted the College as a means to help individual reach these larger, overarching goals. The second difference between typical ad campaigns that the College has launched in the past is the venues that were selected. Digital billboards on I-95, I-395, and I-895, dioramas at BWI Airport, Web banners on websites such as Facebook, and magazine ads in publications such as Urbanite and Southwest magazines were all active participants in the new campaign. Urbanite specifically was an important partner. Noting the close fit between the College's Accelerated and Weekend population and the readership of the Urbanite, the College developed a much more intensive cooperation with the magazine than other venues, a move that appears to have paid off judging by the attendance at information sessions on adult education.

Currently the campaign is under the leadership of SNS Marketing agency, yet the College is conducting research which may lead to the emergence of a new campaign and/or a new agency altogether. As this is a branding campaign (focused on building name recognition of the College) more than a recruiting campaign, it will be difficult to find measurable progress and results until the recruitment cycle completes in Summer 2010.