Some questions and answers
What’s the best way to get in touch to discuss a potential project?
The best way is to pick up the phone and call. Speak to either Mark (410-825-7660 x4) or BethAnne (410-825-7660 x1). If you want to be sure to get us at a particular time, or if you want several people on the call, you can e-mail in advance to set up a time to talk.
Can I just send you an RFP?
You can send us an RFP but we often do not respond to them unless we’ve had some prior contact with someone from your institution and have a sense of your needs.
How much do your services cost?
Generally research projects fall in the range of $60k to $80k. A comprehensive brand strategy incorporating alumni, admissions prospects, internal audiences of faculty, staff and students, etc. will run from $90k to $160 depending on the complexity of the institution. Capital campaign case statements and communications support range from $70k to $120k. Admissions publications programs (consisting of a viewbook and four or five supporting brochures) cost $120k to $180k. To produce a new website, be prepared to spend $90k to $200k. Costs for Web projects vary considerably depending on your plans for hosting the site and your need for written and visual content such as photography and video.
What do I get for my money?
We provide all major services to you in-house: market research, brand strategy, communications planning, creative direction, graphic design, writing, etc. You can learn more about the staff who head each of our areas on our people page. Through our interactive affiliate, Door No. 2, we offer a complete range of services for producing a website: analysis, information architecture, design, writing, programming, and photography. We can build your site on the popular BigTree CMS. So one thing you get for your money is a seasoned front-line team that is dedicated to your project.
How can I be sure who I will be working with?
There is only one team at NCM. There is no hand-off of projects to a different account manager or creative team. Staff turnover is virtually non-existent. The team you meet at the outset of the project is the team you will be working with throughout.
The Importance of Brand Strategy
The mainstream advertising paradigm is push. You develop your message and then force it onto your target audience via repetition. Madison Avenue has developed sophisticated and highly refined mechanisms for calculating this push. But if you work at a nonprofit academic institution, your ability to employ push is limited – if not non-existent. You might as well throw those chapters of your marketing textbooks away. They don’t apply to you (unless your administration is going to restructure their budgets and devote a significantly greater fraction to marketing). This is why a disciplined and proven brand strategy is so essential to academic institutions. With so little ability to use the traditional tools of push-based advertising, it is critical that every one of your communications, even the most casual, conveys your marketing message. You don’t have TV commercials. You need everything – your stationery, sweatshirts, school tour, website, Facebook page, admissions materials, fundraisers – to carry your message. As an academic institution, you are swimming upstream in a commercial world. You use a brand strategy to accomplish your goals.