The Epiphany

Today. It happened. 

I finally figured it out! I decided what "brand" I am going to analyze for my culminating project and it hit me like a mack truck. 

The Backstory

Before I could leave for Spring Break, I had to meet with my Campus Activities Board adviser and my co-chair. We are planning Spring Day -- the biggest student event of the year. The scariest thing that came out of our meeting is that we realized that when we return from Spring Break it will only be four weeks until the reveal party and six weeks until the actual event. We have a lot of work to do. 

The Challenge

So our adviser gave us a challenge. Her, and the rest of Student Programs & Engagement, wants to see fresh new ideas come out of Spring Day. We began researching and I realized that a lot of things that we could improve upon is our strategy. We have been relying on doing the same thing year after year, and it seemed that students were starting to get bored.

We began to ask questions like:

• What are students looking for in a successful Spring Day?
• What aspects of the day are under utilized?
• How could we get students more engaged?

The questions we were asking seemed like a marketing dilemma we needed to fix or enhance. That is when it clicked.

The Epiphany

Spring Day is just one big experiential marketing event. Bentley is the brand and the students are the consumer. Why is Bentley willing to budget tens of thousands of dollars toward this one day at the end of the year? Because Bentley students are worth it, of course. And  because they need to keep us happy if they want us to keep coming back every fall for four years. Spring Day is an event the engages the entire campus and brings all students together in one celebration. It has many layers of branding and significantly contributes to student life at Bentley. 

Satisfied students are the best advocates for a university.  

The Decision

After my Spring Day revelation, I have decided to use Bentley University for the brand that my Marketing Plan is designed for. I am really excited about this decision. It is a brand that I am very knowledgeable about and have plenty of experience with. I will create the Experiential Marketing Plan surrounded Spring Day. This decision will help me to take a big-picture approach to Spring Day and event help me in my event planning. I am excited to create the plan because I will get to see it come to fruition.