Athletics as a Catalyst for School Branding

• Facilities as First Impressions: Athletic stadiums, often centered around football, are seen as a uniquely American tradition that can shape the identities of students, institutions, and communities. From fields and courts to stadiums and signage, athletic facilities send a clear message: we invest in our students and we’re proud of our programs.
• Merchandise and Mascots: Spirit wear, team colors, and mascots are more than just fun, they’re vital branding tools. Whether worn at family-friendly Friday night games or shared across social media, these elements reinforce pride and recognition in the broader community.
• Creating a Unique Fan Experience: The Chippewa Champions Center at Central Michigan University is a shining example of using athletics to make a memorable first impression to all campus visitors. Located directly behind the north end zone, the center is one of the most unique fan experiences in the Mid-American Conference (MAC) and is located just steps from the Chippewas’ locker room, bringing fans up close and personal to the action on the field.

• Inclusion Through Shared Experiences: Games, practices, team nights, and fundraising can act as additional gathering points that unite students, staff, families, and alumni. Whether you’re on the team, in the band, broadcasting the game, or cheering from the stands, there’s a place to belong. These shared experiences help create deep emotional ties to the school community and to each other.
• Multi-Use Spaces That Serve Everyone: Creating flexible athletic spaces that serve educational, community, and event needs is a must. They serve PE classes by day, sports teams by night, and community events on weekends. Designing these spaces to be used by both male and female sports, and choosing durable materials that encourage year-round use, make great financial sense for educational institutions that often rely on public funding.
• Elevating The Student Experience: The award-winning Hudsonville Fieldhouse has ample space to support a variety of sports programs, community members, and school classes. It was important to the district to create spaces that reflected student talent, celebrated their successes, and reinforced the brand and culture of Hudsonville. 

Driving Student Excitement and Retention

• K-12 Impact: Competitive or high-profile athletics attract families and offer opportunities for students to choose what best suits their talents. More schools are adding options in fast-growing sports like girls’ flag football, boys’ volleyball, rugby, and lacrosse. These offerings pique student interest, attract new demographics, and promote year-round campus activity.
• Giving K-12 a Collegiate Feel: The turf fields at Woodhaven High School promote a sense of school pride with bold logos and school colors that evoke a collegiate feel to the complex, while also promote accessibility for all students, athletes, and community members regardless of gender or physical abilities.
• Higher Ed Impact: Athletics can be a deal-breaker or deal-maker during the college selection process, especially for student-athletes and school spirit-minded students and families. Highlighting athletics during campus tours and recruitment campaigns helps elevate the entire student experience. Winning seasons, legendary games, and beloved mascots are powerful touchpoints that also keep alumni connected, and invested in, your school.
• A Multi-Functional Alumni Space: The Stadium Club at Western Michigan University (WMU) transformed from primarily game day use to a 24/7/365 a year entertaining, fundraising, and intimate conversation space. The goal of the updated suite was to offer an elegant and welcoming experience to patrons that is unique to WMU.

Expanding the Definition of Athletics

• Intramural and Recreational Sports: In higher ed, intramural sports provide an outlet for physical activity, connection, and community without the intensity of varsity athletics. They help support student wellness and provide opportunities for leadership and event planning, especially for students not involved in other clubs.
• Developing Year-Round, Well-Rounded Athletes: Schools are shifting away from the “one-sport athlete” mindset and instead encouraging participation in multiple sports or off-season training programs. This approach helps prevent burnout and injury, while promoting teamwork, adaptability, and resilience.
• Exploring eSports: Competitive gaming programs are rapidly growing in both K–12 and higher education. East Kentwood High School in West Michigan has one of the top-ranked eSports teams in the nation and was placed in the Top 20 programs by USA Today. With more than 100 students on the team, their eSports program offers new ways to engage students who might not connect with traditional sports while still teaching them teamwork, strategy, and discipline.

Positive Impacts on a Student’s Learning Experience and Environment

• Upgraded and properly maintained systems create learning environments that are comfortable and limit noisy disruptions
• Promoting sustainability in tangible ways can provide hands-on learning opportunities for students
• Efficient buildings contribute to a better global environment, benefiting students’ well-being and their local communities

By adhering to the 2021 IECC, schools in Michigan can create optimized learning environments that prioritize comfort, health, sustainability, and innovation. These benefits not only enhance the day-to-day experiences of students but also equip them with knowledge and values for a sustainable future.

Aligning Marketing and Enrollment for Greater Impact

One of the biggest opportunities for smaller colleges is to create synergy between the marketing and enrollment teams. These departments are often siloed, each with their own fixed budgets, which can lead to inefficiencies, duplicated efforts, or misaligned messaging. When marketing and enrollment teams work alone, institutions risk wasting resources on campaigns that don’t support the whole picture.

One school that is tackling this problem head-on is McPherson College, a private, liberal arts institution taking a strategic, integrated approach to enrollment marketing. Their efforts serve as a strong example of how breaking down these barriers can drive success. At McPherson, marketing and enrollment professionals collaborate closely, sharing data and strategies regularly. This team alignment, supported from the top down, ensures that the school’s messaging remains consistent and targeted, leading to more efficient use of resources and stronger prospective student engagement. And this collaboration is having a positive impact on the College’s current marketing efforts. They are up more than 30 deposits year over year and have already exceeded their application goal by 40 applicants for 2025. By fostering intentional connections between these departments, McPherson College has created a model that other institutions can follow to help maximize their marketing dollars.

Another crucial aspect of budgeting is understanding how your competitors are positioning themselves in the digital landscape. While exact marketing budgets can be difficult to uncover, a competitor assessment can provide valuable insights. Look at the types of digital ads peer institutions are running, the platforms they’re using, and how prominently they appear in search results compared to your institution. Evaluating their online presence can help identify gaps, opportunities, and best practices to refine your own marketing strategy and maximize your budget.

Understanding how competitors allocate their marketing budgets — whether it’s on digital advertising, social media campaigns, direct outreach, or campus improvements — can help institutions make more strategic decisions. For example, if a competitor university is heavily investing in digital advertising or strategic branding, it’s important to understand how that might impact your institution’s visibility and perception. Competitive benchmarking helps inform budget allocations and ensures that marketing efforts are proactive rather than reactive.

Additionally, assessing where competitors are falling short, such as outdated graphics, off-brand messaging, or poor website navigation, can provide an opportunity to differentiate and attract students in a more cost-effective way.

The Ripple Effect: Beyond Enrollment Numbers

Strategic marketing investments also contribute to stronger alumni networks, community engagement, and long-term brand equity. By prioritizing marketing and enrollment efforts as an institutional strategy rather than a departmental concern, colleges and universities can build a foundation for long-term success and ensure they remain competitive in an evolving higher education landscape.

For small and private colleges looking to maximize their marketing budget, the key is strategic alignment, informed spending, and a clear understanding of market positioning. By fostering collaboration between marketing and enrollment teams, setting realistic goals, and analyzing competitive data, institutions can ensure that every dollar is used effectively to drive enrollment and institutional success.

As the demographic cliff looms over higher education, threatening enrollment and financial stability, smaller private institutions with fewer resources face a stark choice: adapt or struggle. While the shrinking pool of traditional students presents significant challenges, it also creates opportunities for innovation. Many colleges are already pivoting to attract nontraditional students, such as adult learners and career changers, but additional strategies can help institutions thrive despite the shift.

By embracing four strategic shifts—redefining value, reimagining spaces, strengthening community ties and refining communication—institutions can not only survive but thrive in this new era. Connecting with students and showing them they have found a place where they belong can make a difference and positively impact enrollment outcomes.

Creating flexible and adaptive spaces that can easily be reconfigured for different uses allows institutions to repurpose existing spaces. Classrooms and lecture halls can be designed with movable walls and flexible furniture to accommodate various teaching methods, from traditional lectures to remote education and collaborative group work. 

Repurposing or creating a scheduling system for underused areas on campus—like library spaces, computer labs, or classrooms—into private hoteling spaces that can accommodate unique needs can set your campus apart. From private areas for mother’s rooms to technology-rich content creation spaces, modifying existing space on campus ensures that your facilities remain functional and relevant, even as the institution’s needs evolve.

3. Strengthen Community Engagement 

Institutions can also deepen their engagement with local communities and employers to secure much-needed enrollment boosts. Almost two-thirds of undergraduate students attend a college within 50 miles of their home, making local connections critical for attracting and retaining students. 

To strengthen community ties, colleges can align programs with local workforce needs, offer community education, expand internship programs and become hubs for innovation and economic development. These local connections can lead to partnerships with area high schools for dual enrollment programs and better position the college or university to receive grants and government funding that support regional economic development. 

When a college is embedded within its immediate environment, word-of-mouth, local partnerships, earned media and community-based outreach become powerful, cost-effective tools for attracting students. This approach benefits the local economy and attracts students interested in living in the community they know.

What do we mean by our “ecosystem of teams?”

We recognize that to truly support educational institutions, we must offer holistic solutions that address all aspects of their growth and success. Our ecosystem approach does just that by placing our clients and their students at the center of everything we do. This means that rather than offering a disjointed array of services, we provide integrated solutions that address the many needs of our clients. Other professional services firms will typically structure themselves in one of two ways:

1. They accumulate “add-on” services that can be tacked on to a primary offering for a cost, but the business functions mainly to support the main service; or
2. They run distinct business units which provide robust offerings but generally operate independently from one another.

The shortcoming of both these approaches is that the client receives only one type of service at a time. But we understand how your unique challenges intersect and overlap. That’s why we see issues like enrollment, budgets, building function, planning, training, and maintenance as opportunities that can be addressed in a more holistic way.

Example One: Redefining the Educational Experience for Local Elementary Students

Imagine a K-12 school district that is planning for major renovations and expansion across multiple elementary schools. The district needs bond planning services to secure funding, innovative furniture design to support modern learning environments, and commissioning services to ensure that the new systems and structures operate efficiently. In a traditional model, the school district might work with a consulting firm for bond planning, a furniture vendor for the design and procurement of furnishings, and a separate firm for commissioning services. Some firms might even have these services all under one roof, but at GMB we don’t see these as separate issues to solve—they are all part of a single, complex solution.

We have a different approach. Instead of addressing individual challenges, our teams consider the entire experience your district offers and uncover how to make it a reality. By partnering with us, the district doesn’t just get these services delivered under one roof—they gain a holistic approach where everything is interconnected. Beyond the initial services, they also receive attention in critical areas like security consulting, energy management, and district branding. Our security consultants collaborate with the district from the beginning to design safe and secure learning environments that protect students and staff, and the planning team communicates these needs with the community. Simultaneously, our marketing team and educational planners work to create a cohesive district identity that resonates with both the community and prospective students, while our interior designers collaborate with the district’s educators to design a furniture plan that supports student-centered learning environments. Beyond simply ensuring that systems—HVAC, lighting, and more—function as intended, our energy management teams align these efforts with the district’s broader goals.

Our ecosystem of teams ensures that every aspect of the project, from securing initial funding to the final commissioning, is aligned with the district’s unique educational vision and operational needs. By partnering with us, the district benefits from a truly integrated approach, where all elements are connected and work together to create a more cohesive and effective learning environment—far beyond what could be achieved by hiring individual consultants for each service.

Example Two: Attracting and Retaining Students Through Enhanced Facilities

A university is planning to build a new student center, a central hub designed to enhance campus life and serve as a key attraction for prospective students. This project requires not only architectural design and engineering, but also effective branding to ensure that the new center resonates with the university’s identity and draws in future students. In a traditional model, the university might engage an architecture firm for the design, an engineering firm for the structural work, and a marketing agency for the branding. Each firm works independently, leading to longer timelines and potential misalignments.

We step outside the traditional realm of problem-solving. We view the entire project through a holistic lens, considering how every element—from safety and energy management to sustainability and enrollment—works together to create a cohesive experience that reflects the university’s values and vision. By partnering with us, the university doesn’t just get architectural design, engineering, and branding services under one roof; they gain a deeply integrated approach where everything is interconnected. Our teams begin by collaborating closely with university stakeholders to understand their architectural vision for the student center. Our engineering team works in tandem with the architects to ensure the facility is safe, efficient, and functional. Meanwhile, we engage with the university’s Marketing Office to develop a branding strategy that incorporates the university’s identity into every aspect of the student center, from signage and wayfinding to updated print materials and messaging. Additionally, we integrate carbon neutrality goals and campus planning into the project, helping the university meet sustainability targets campus-wide, an increasingly important element to both current and prospective students.

But a new building doesn’t just bring in new students—we help connect the dots between the built environment, the university’s brand, and the right-fit students the institution wants to attract. The final product is a student center that embodies the university’s values, meets the needs of students, and serves as a compelling attraction for future generations of students.