Selling an Image

In the movie A Beautiful Mind, the faculty of Princeton University honor economist John Nash by laying their pens before him. And though the scene is one of the film's more memorable, it never happened, says Marilyn Marks, the school's media relations director.

During the filming, her job was not to worry about such factual inaccuracies, but to ensure that stereotypes about Princeton, like its reputation as a school full of rich, snobby white kids, were kept out of the movie.

"It's important to make people understand that what Princeton was when F. Scott Fitzgerald was here is not what it is now," Marks says.

Reviewing project requests from artists looking to shoot films or commercials on campus--to ensure they portray the school in the best light possible--is just one of the ways colleges and universities work to control their image.

An increasing number of schools are embracing marketing to improve their standing and reputation, creating an image that resonates with prospective students.

Although Duke has its own version of the marketing formula, the marketing of an educational institution is very different from that of a traditional company.

"Every university works hard to present itself to the public in the best way it can," says Christoph Guttentag, director of undergraduate admissions. "And I think that universities never come up with a single method and say, 'That's it, we're done."

Duke does not have a marketing department.

Since Duke's new strategic plan, known as "Building on Excellence," was instituted, the administration has begun examining the kind of students the University attracts and the subtle messages it sends to prospective applicants. For this reason, the University has started to re-examine its admissions materials and how these materials are perceived.

Burness says sometimes those materials "are produced without stepping back and asking, 'What kind of message are we conveying here?'" Guttentag says a review of the University's image and admissions material is currently in its analytical phase.

Such a review might be a good idea, says freshman Nikhil Kekre, who was put off by a picture on the cover of the viewbook of students building a snowman. Kekre, who is from Pittsburgh, was looking more for pictures of a nice warm day or people throwing frisbees on the quad.

Rojstaczer notes Duke used to present itself as "an institution which is not overly serious where you can get a great education and have fun in the process. It stands in contrast to a number of other universities that stress education and learning above anything else."

Recently, however, he has noticed a change in Duke's marketing, which he says clearly is attempting to recruit a more studious applicant.

"There appears to be some effort to tweak the marketing a bit to try to attract a more serious type of student than Duke has generally enrolled in the past. So the image of the University that the powers-that-be are trying to portray to the public is a tad more serious than it once was."

Burness also says Duke markets itself through the recommendation of its current students and alumni. If an improvement in the quality of life or academics at Duke occurs, there is no need to spin it.

And of course, the University tries to approach its marketing with a democratic approach.

Nancy Davis, associate vice chancellor for university relations at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, says that, at a university, support of the faculty, staff and students is extremely important to the choices that are made. "There could never be a top-down approach," she says.

Ben Birnbaum, executive director of marketing communications at Boston College, agrees that administratiors take much more into consideration than profits.

"We hire prestigious faculty because we think it's right, not because we think it'll increase customer satisfaction," Birnbaum says. He says academic marketing is not undertaken "with the same kind of zeal and resources" as at a corporation, which tends to budget more towards selling its products and image.

Birnbaum says the issue of marketing is really one of strategic decisions. Well-known institutions such as Boston College and Duke can afford to take chances by making major changes, knowing their reputations are relatively ingrained in the public's consciousness. If a university decides a choice was a mistake, it can usually repair the damage before it causes a negative impact with the public.

"The Enron case could never happen at a college," Birnbaum says, noting that a college's esteem would never plummet so rapidly. However, there are some ways in which marketing of colleges and universities is taking on a more corporate style. Davis says UNC-CH, along with a number of other universities, is approaching the communications aspect of academia from more of an integrated marketing perspective.

Through the integration of the marketing and communications functions, "we endeavor to convey one message throughout the university," Davis says. They are also working to ensure these functions are grounded in solid research of the public's perception, using tools like focus groups to evaluate the current thinking.

Still, the marketing and communications departments within universities are often much smaller than those of a business. "If you look at the size of our news desk compared to a company, there's no relation," says Marks, whose school has only four people dedicated to handling news.

Burness says Duke's marketing is assisted by its athletic programs.

"Basketball makes a big difference with our national recognition," he says. Especially "the fact that we win championships with a clean program and actual student athletes." Kekre agrees basketball has been a great marketing tool for Duke. "What other school has so many kids wearing its own apparel around campus?"

Freshman Kym Stansell, who has been in a commercial for Duke, says airing Duke advertisements during televised basketball games is a good way to show Duke is filled with people who are smart and have a balanced experience at school.

Back at BC, though, Birnbaum says the "Flutie Factor," a reference to BC's former star quarterback Doug Flutie, is overestimated. BC's success in athletics did bring in a larger applicant pool, but did relatively little to improve the quality of incoming classes. He says it was fortunate that at the time, BC was working through its own strategic plan, so it was better able to take advantage of the increase in applicants. He emphasizes, however, that Flutie's famous play was not a major turning point for BC.

In Duke's case, the current strategic plan will not be a major force of change for the school's marketing plan. "I suspect there may be some things to be done this year," Burness says, "but it is an evolutionary process."

Although Rojstaczer, who has been at Duke for 11 years, notices a change in Duke's marketing tactics, he says the changes will likely be ineffective, and that marketing a university in one particular light does little to change its true character.

"It behooves whoever is involved in the marketing process to reflect the personality of this institution as honestly and as thoroughly as possible. Every institution has its own unique personality. My own view is that the education between institutions, at least in terms of classes offered, isn't that different. Students pick universities based on reputation and whether or not they're a good fit for that institution."

Rojstaczer adds, "There's an effort to cast Duke in a more serious light than it was previously. I personally don't think that's going to succeed in its goal. For the foreseeable future, Duke will have the same type of ethos and personality it's had since I've been here and probably a decade before that."

Peri Edelstein contributed to this story.