Tag Archives: Monmouth College

All hail the power of video! Last week, I blogged about how my wife has finally bought-in. She received a holiday video last december from her alma mater, this year just a standard email.

She was disappointed, but the disappointment didn’t last long because guess what showed up this week?

I promised her not to be too brutal with my criticism in the previous post, she LOVES her school, so I didn’t even mention it by name. Well, looks like I can now because Monmouth College redeemed itself by sending out a 2012 holiday video.

Now, it’s no great achievement. I kind of like the concept, but it’s a pretty basic video. The big question I have is about their PR/marketing/fundraising strategy.

Was this planned all along… text email followed by video email? Or did they get negative feedback when there wasn’t a video this year? Were there lots of people like my wife who were disappointed they didn’t produce a video this year, so they quickly put something together?

I don’t know the answer to that, but either way it’s clear video is a power communications tool.

–Tony Gnau

We received a piece of regular ole’ mail at our home the other day that caught my attention. My wife is a Monmouth College grad and they sent us a mailer encouraging donations to the school’s annual scholarship fund.

What caught my eye was the image of an online video player and a QR code.

You know video has come a long way when it’s even being incorporated into standard mailers. The QR code sends you to a YouTube video of a student talking about getting a scholarship to Monmouth and what it has meant to her.

The video itself isn’t anything special, although I applaud Monmouth for producing it. I much rather hear from the student herself than read a short and sanitized snippet about her.

Where Monmouth really scores big points is recognizing how powerful video is as a medium, and then looking for creative ways to get their videos in front of people.

Traditional mailers will continue to hit our mailboxes, but there’s no reason you can’t give them a modern twist. Monmouth’s leaders found a great way to do it.

–Tony Gnau

I love Monmouth College. I’ve been there and my wife is a proud alum. It’s a small Illinois school that doesn’t think small, and its leaders understand the power of video.

The school’s YouTube channel is loaded will all sorts of good stuff, but my favorite has to be this… 1993 Monmouth College Admission Video.

LOVE… IT!

By 1993 standards, I’m sure it was terrific. Not so much by today’s standards, but that’s not the point. I love that they posted this on YouTube and then shared it via Facebook. It’s kitschy… and kitschy is fun.

Why not post it!? School leaders clearly aren’t trying to use this as their current recruiting video. The school’s “revolutionary classroom… utilize sophisticated computers.” Hilarious stuff when you see the images that accompany those lines.

Companies could even look at this another way. Dust off any outdated video and include it in the next project. Sort of a… look how far we’ve come… example.

Regardless, the main lesson here is that the Monmouth video is cheesy… school leaders know it’s cheesy… and it puts Monmouth in a good light.

Don’t be afraid to by a little kitschy.

–Tony Gnau