Marketing and Communications (Marcom) is one of the four main service areas of the PEAK Initiative.
Prior to PEAK, Marcom resources varied between campuses/colleges/units. This led to inconsistent quality of services, inconsistent adherence to branding standards, inequitable access to services, and duplication of services.
Not all campuses/colleges/units experienced all of these challenges, but through surveys and interviews with University of Minnesota Marcom professionals and leaders, we found that there is more room for consistency and equity in Marcom service delivery.
Positions for existing staff will be created to support specialization in:
- Account Services
- Creative Services
- Digital Communications
- Measurement and Analytics
This will create equitable and inclusive opportunities via clearly defined roles with corresponding standardized responsibilities, classifications, and compensation. Alignment between University Relations (UR) Leadership, Marcom leads, and local Marcom professionals will be enhanced to formalize accountability between the groups.
Marcom resources are listed below.
How is the Work Changing?
Digital communications, creative services, account services, and measurement and analytics support will be centralized in teams within UR that will provide common good services to the system. Local Marcom leads will be empowered to connect with high-level strategy, and will continue to direct unit-specific work.
Individuals performing work in the common good services team will benefit from:
- Opportunities for career advancement through clearly defined opportunities for professional development
- Developing expertise in a certain area
- Working in a community of similarly skilled professionals
Work Today
Staff and resources across campuses/colleges/units can vary widely, which can lead to:
- Inequitable access to services
- Duplication of services
- Inconsistent quality
- Inconsistent adherence to brand standards
Work Tomorrow
Campuses/colleges/units will have:
- Equitable access to Marcom services
- Clear roles and responsibilities
- Consistent quality
- Consistent branding
The UR teams providing common good services will support projects that directly:
- Relate to the website development of primary campuses/colleges/units and related publicly facing center/institute websites.
- Support the campuses/colleges/units or University strategic goals.
- Achieve clear marketing objectives.
If additional consideration is needed to determine if a website/webpage is in-scope, UR will employ a common framework to evaluate the work. UR will not support secondary or tertiary website development that may be related to departmental, faculty, or administrative matters.
Common Good Services
Marcom work that will be performed through UR includes:
Account Services
UR is responsible for raising the University’s profile externally, for promoting the President’s priorities/broader initiatives, and for providing guidance across college/campus/units in these service areas:
- Brand Management
- Marketing Planning & Strategy Consultation
- Paid Advertising & Freelance Management
- Social Media Strategy
- User Experience*
- Digital Strategy & Consultation*
- Project Management
*Indicates service must be provided by UR if a website is considered to be in-scope
Creative Services
UR is responsible for raising the University’s profile externally, for promoting the President’s priorities/broader initiatives, and for providing guidance across college/campus/units in these service areas:
- Graphic Design*
- Multimedia Production*
- Written Content*
- Digital Creative & Production*
*Indicates service must be provided by UR if a website is considered to be in-scope.
Digital Communications
UR is responsible for raising the University’s profile externally, for promoting the President’s priorities/broader initiatives, and for providing guidance across college/campus/units in these service areas:
- Web Development*
- Knowledge Transfer*
*Indicates service must be provided by UR if a website is considered to be in-scope.
Measurements and Analytics
UR is responsible for raising the University’s profile externally, for promoting the President’s priorities/broader initiatives, and for providing guidance across college/campus/units in these service areas:
- Measurement & Analytics Strategy, Consultation and Training
- Small-Scale Surveys
- Strategic & Vendor Support for Large-Scale Surveys
*Indicates service must be provided by UR if a website is considered to be in-scope.
Campus/College/Unit Local Services
Marcom work that will continue to be performed locally includes:
Account Services
Brand Management
- Routine enforcement of the brand locally (e.g., centers)
Marketing Planning and Strategy Consultation
- Developing and implementing the actual unit-specific plan
- Blogs and vlogs production not supported for SEO
Paid Advertising and Freelance Management
- Implementation of college-specific advertising (brand, reputation and recruitment)
- Implementation of strategy (though UR will facilitate this work through a vendor as needed)
- Contract facilitation (including invoice management, etc.) on unit-specific work
- Relationship management with local or selected freelancers
- Commercial filming contracts
Social Media
- Content creation, management, and posting to local accounts
User Experience
- Resolution of smaller day-to-day accessibility issues identified through testing
- Management of accessibility tools (offered by OIT)
- Actual usability testing (performed by Usability Lab)
Digital Strategy and Consultation
- Unit-specific paid search strategy
- Unit-specific search engine optimization strategy
- E-commerce
- Digital marketing automation
Creative Services
Graphic Design
- Annual reports (including giving reports)
- Print magazines
- Alumni magazines
- Recruitment viewbooks
- Event materials
- Dean/faculty requests
- Facts and figures sheets
- Powerpoint presentations (UR provides templates)
Multimedia Production
- Non-Twin Cities photography and videography (not including editing)
- Blogs and vlogs production
- Audio production (including podcast production)
Written Content
- Grant writing
- Donor letters
- Stewardship documents
- Scientific writing
- Departmental and operational information (non-feature work) included in annual reports, magazines, and newsletters
- Viewbooks
- Event materials
- Website content that requires specialty knowledge
- Creating and maintenance of best practices documentation
Digital Creative and Production
- Digital asset management for unit-specific libraries
- Day-to-day needs (content updates, changing images, etc.) that can be done with quick turnaround by the local unit
- Writing for recruitment marketing
- VR
- Photo + Video for non-Twin Cities campuses
Digital Strategy and Consultation
- Unit-specific paid search strategy
- Unit-specific search engine optimization strategy
- E-commerce
- Digital marketing automation
Digital Communications
Web Development
- Website development for intranets, faculty lab sites, transactional sites
- Day-to-day content updates
- Private restricted data, ticketing, and fee collection
Measurement and Analytics
Market Research
- Develop and execute large-scale surveys (UR can offer strategic and vendor support as needed)
Insight and Analytics
- Data collection, measurement and analysis
- Data visualization
- Pulling data
How will roles change regarding Marcom work?
It depends on individual and the needs of the campus/college/unit. Let’s take Andres for example.
Andres is a campus communicator who performs a variety of marketing and communications responsibilities. He is currently focused on internal and external communications. Andres enjoys being in his department but would like to specialize in website development and have a more holistic understanding of the work at UMN.
There will be some parts of Andres’ work that will stay in his campus communications office, and some may be supported by other groups providing common good services. These will also be determined, in partnership with his local Marcom leader, through the PEAK Initiative workforce transition process.
Marketing and Communications Questions
Marketing and Communication questions have been archived. Current general PEAK questions can be found on the Frequently Asked Questions page.
Marcom questions have been archived as of June 30, 2023.
Marketing and Communication Resources
March 2023
Implementation Phase 1 - Milestone 3 Town Hall
- View the Marketing and Communications Milestone 3 Town Hall presentation
- Watch the Marketing and Communications recording (for University of Minnesota staff systemwide - login required)
November 2022
Implementation Phase 1 - Milestone 2 Informational Meeting
Contacts
Sponsor & Transition Teams
View the PEAK Initiative Sponsors.
As each area moves through the PEAK milestones, the leadership of the campus/college/administrative unit forms transition teams. When your area is actively engaged in the process, you will be able to find your representative on the list of transition team members from Finance, Human Resources (HR), Information Technology (IT), and Marketing and Communications (Marcom).
PEAK Office
Email us at [email protected], or use the PEAK contact form to contact the PEAK office.