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Higher Education Marketing Organizational Assessment Align Your Marketing Team To Your Strategy

Whether you're preparing for change or already in it, an organizational assessment gives you the clarity—and evidence—you need to make a case for resources, restructure a team, or justify tough decisions.

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Set Your Strategy Up for Success

A new strategy is only as strong as your team’s ability to execute it. Our marketing organizational assessment identifies strengths, uncovers inefficiencies, and highlights the gaps holding your team back.

We typically step in at key moments of change:

New Leadership: A new president, chancellor, or VP often means a fresh start—and big questions. We help new leaders quickly understand the marketing team’s capabilities and surface opportunities for improvement.

New Strategic Plan: When a college-wide strategic plan is launched, marketing must deliver on new goals. We evaluate whether your current structure, staffing, and skillsets can support the strategy—or if changes are needed.

Budget & Resource Pressure: Whether you’re making the case for investment or managing constraints, our third-party assessment provides the data and insight you need to advocate for your team—or make necessary cuts with confidence.

Our Marketing Organizational Assessment Process

Our approach evaluates both organizational structure and operational efficiency to help you build a more effective, future-ready marketing team.

1. Discovery: Through interviews, surveys, and audits of tools, processes, and vendor contracts, we learn how your team operates today.

2. Evaluation: We analyze what we’ve learned to uncover misalignments, inefficiencies, and untapped potential.

3. Recommendations: We present actionable findings to your leadership team—and can tailor presentations for executive committees and boards.

4. Implementation: We can support your next steps, from redesigning org charts to facilitating team workshops.

Example Engagements

Our consultants bring extensive marketing experience working in marketing leadership within colleges and as consultants to higher education. Over the past 20 years, OHO has partnered with over 120 colleges and universities on marketing initiatives.

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Centre College

Following the arrival of a new president, OHO assessed the Office of Communications to determine whether the team had the staffing and budget to support the college’s new strategic plan.

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Owens Community College

A VP engaged OHO to conduct a marketing org assessment and digital audit. Our recommendations defined a clearer strategic purpose, improved operations, and guided better resourcing.

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Villanova University

After cross-campus discovery and peer benchmarking, our assessment identified key staffing and skill gaps, and included a financial proposal for necessary digital marketing assets, infrastructure, and advertising spend.

Your Roadmap for Success

The final report shows how your marketing team and efforts align with your institution’s strategic goals and can identify opportunities for operational and financial efficiency. The findings serve as a roadmap for next steps, whether that means:

Filling skill gaps – Marketing, especially digital marketing, requires current skill sets that many print- and communication-focused departments have not yet resourced in their department. 

Redefining roles – The needs of the college and strategic marketing department have evolved in recent years, and positions often need to evolve as a result.

Implementing new process – The steps to change management when implementing new processes are critical for buy-in from the beginning.

Building board or organizational alignment – The Board of Trustees play a key role in supporting university-wide initiatives, especially those around reputation management, brand building, advertising, and fiscal decisions. Our team of consultants can present a high-level summary of findings to help with that critical level of buy-in.

Let's Start a Conversation

Ready to evaluate and elevate your marketing team? Fill out the form to schedule a conversation with one of our consultants. We’ll walk you through the process and help determine if the time is right for an assessment.