Lessons Learned (and Taught) at eduWeb Summit 2022
Ah, the college experience.
The late nights studying, the lifelong friends made, the 2 x 3 foot dorm rooms, all of the meals in the cafeteria, the digital endeavors your institution undertakes and the necessary alignment it requires across internal teams to create an all-encompassing DXP that enables usability, ease of management, and governance and accessibility accuracies.
Wait, what?
It’s true, an institution’s digital capabilities and technological presence now inevitably play a role in the “college experience.”
The eduWeb Summit is a 3-day event committed to this intersection of higher education and technology, and we are proud to have sponsored and attended it!
We Collaborated
In its 17th year, the eduWeb Summit gathers higher education professionals and industry partners who are passionate about advancing their marketing, communications, and digital work. It incorporates the value of collaboration in the context of problem-solving by hosting events like extensive workshops, webinars, and master classes.
And whether we sparked up a random conversation in line for a morning muffin or networked with attendees at our booth, connecting with people in real life always reinvigorates us.
We Taught
A high-point of the summit was the keynote presentation by two of our lead Digital Strategists, Mandee Englert and Chaney Kourouniotis. Both held previous leadership roles at two higher education institutions: Penn State and Stanford, respectively. With extensive backgrounds and a firsthand understanding of the needs in higher ed, Mandee and Chaney provide relevant and useful perspectives that always assists our continued work with higher education institutions.
Their presentation was titled “From Campus to Consulting: Lessons from the Journey to the Dark Side.” Having sat on both sides of the client/agency relationship, they shared their relevant insight and discussed crucial tips when undertaking a digital project, like how to align internal stakeholders and build a strong case for digital investment, the importance of turning your digital strategy into a valuable practice, as well as the realities of Google Analytics 4.
We Learned
eduWeb was an incredible experience. It offered us a space to really hear what is going on at each university, what projects they’re working on, and which specific digital pain points they might have.
The range of schools at the summit was astounding; from the Stanfords to the Community Colleges, no type of school was left unrepresented. On top of this, the continuous open-forums enabled all schools to start on a level-playing field and have a chance to discuss the needs specific to their institution. In the end, it supported the greater good of higher education everywhere, a vision which we at FFW share.
Derry Backenkeller, our Director of Business Development and eduWeb attendee maintains it’s vital to “keep the conversation going – extending a hand, digging into specific pain points these institutions are having.” After events like eduWeb, we’re always eager to adjust our perspective using what we heard and learned to hit the ground running.
We'll Move Forward with You
We understand that the sustainment of success at higher ed institutions is becoming increasingly co-dependent on digital, and we’re here to mitigate any inevitable frustrations and stress that comes from undertaking a digital project. Check out our some of our other insights into how leveraging digital can empower higher education institution’s impact:
Whether you need to migrate to a platform that better suits your needs, ensure your site’s compliance with privacy and security standards, or build a new site from the ground up that completely caters to you, we have the expertise to minimize headaches and deliver a solution providing immediate improved capabilities and impact, and optimized for long-term success.
Trying to improve your “college experience?” You can always drop us a line to discuss your unique needs with our digital experts, or click here to see a number of resources on our work scaling digital at higher ed institutions.