Brand Awareness Campaign: Horizons Magazine

THE NEED
Create College of the Mainland’s first magazine publication pioneering the path for subsequent biannual issues. The magazine would highlight significant college contributions to the community, donor recognition, new facilities, enriching areas of study and student success stories.

MY APPROACH
Working with various stakeholders and collaborating with all members of the marketing team, we developed an initial publication that would appeal to current students, potential students, parents, the greater taxing district and service communities, Chamber of Commerce, Board of Trustees and donors while being mindful of diversity and perspectives. Each article would be designed as its own entity with unique graphics. In an age of ever-changing media and colorful options begging for our attention at every turn, unique page spread designs would help fulfill short attention spans and maintain interest to turn the page. Engaging visuals uniquely highlighted targeted topics at COM such as the highly-rated Nursing program, the first college in America to establish and offer a Process Technology program (PTEC), and the widely-recognized and award-winning COM Theatre program led by H. Russ Brown. With such a diverse audience, design approaches took careful considerations in regards to project goals, demographics, popular culture influences and the end-user experience for brand equity.

THE RESULT
First launched in 2019, the Horizons print magazines have been very successful with design portraying cohesive attributes of modern and fun while retaining conservative elements of integrity. Each issue has been delivered in print to over 109,000 homes and local leadership. Horizons has contributed to increased brand awareness and engagement, program growth, positive community feedback, increased donor contributions and an increase in college enrollment (the college experienced record enrollment for the Fall 2023 and Spring 2024 semesters).

MY ROLE
Research and strategy, naming, design thinking, branding, graphic design and layout, co-editor, project management, aspects of web page design collaboration.