Digital Advertising on Campus

This past week I invited REACH Marketing to do a webinar for my colleagues and I. I first became aware of REACH Marketing or similar services through my work with campus recreation at two other universities.

The concept is simple. Use TV monitors to advertise on a network all across campus. Now I know those of us in higher education are cringing at the idea of spending money especially on TVs, computers and a software license.

However here is something to consider:
- The cost of paper.
- The cost of ink for printers and copiers.
- The shelf life of flyers around campus.
- The man hours spent discarding old or torn down flyers/posters.
- The effectiveness of flyer/brochure centers

The alternative:
- No paper/ink costs for flyers/posters.
- Interactive marketing and advertising in full color.
- Ability to capture audiences with video "commercials".
- Ability to generate revenue to cover expenses.
- Ability to condense flyer/brochure racks/centers.
- Ability to display a scrolling calendar for the area.
- Ability to utilize touch screens with features such as on-demand printing, registration and emailing.

During the webinar we saw demonstrations of all this great technology and the softwares abilities. As we progressed I saw the eyes of my colleagues light up with the potential. Suddenly this concept for our department is branching out into a campus wide possibility.

The things my colleagues and I were most interested in:
- The amount of compartmentalized control over various sites on campus.
- The ability to display the site's calendar. (i.e. great for conferences, reservations, etc.)
- No more paper, litter and old announcements being posted.
- Possible sustainability advantage.
- The ability to generate revenue from student organizations, campus departments, career services, etc.
- In short we were really looking at the campus wide buy in.

REACH typically services recreation centers, gyms and some student centers. We are considering using REACH for housing across 12 different facilities.

Questions for the audience:

1. Are students ready for a flyer free residence hall? campus?

2. Is there a positive carbon offset between printing flyers and using digital advertising?

3. Is your campus using anything like this?

4. Would Student Orgs, Departments or Local Businesses pay to advertise?

If this sounds like something your campus might benefit from like 300+ other campuses visit REACH here.