Is a Video Role Now a Non-Negotiable?: Shifts Reshaping MarComms in Schools
From routine to relevance. Many teams are still operating on routine and that’s normal. We do newsletters. We produce written content. We post static graphics. We repeat what’s familiar because it’s what the system supports.
But the question we’re hearing more often is: when do we stop and re-look at what’s actually working?
How are families consuming information now?
What are they spending time with?
What are they sharing?
What’s building trust and what’s simply filling up our social pages?
This is the audit we’re really talking about.
Not just what you’re producing, but how it’s landing. Are newsletters still being read? Are static posts gaining traction? Are we paying attention to resonance– shares, saves, comments, time spent on page–or just output volume?
A structural shift worth naming is how teams are reorganizing around engagement.
If video is now one of the strongest drivers of trust, familiarity, and enrollment confidence, should it be a non-negotiable capability inside school teams? And if the answer is yes, the harder question follows: what needs to change to make room for it because most teams aren’t adding headcount.
These aren’t content questions. They’re system questions.
From Standalone Content to Serialized Thinking
Recent conversations around serialized formats–including insights shared during the Ogilvy webinar–reinforced something important for enrollment leaders:amilies respond to continuity.
Enrollment today is shaped by familiarity, trust, and repeated reassurance over time. That requires plot, not just standalone content.
The challenge? Plot can’t live inside systems designed purely for volume.
When teams are structured around delivery rather than narrative ownership, even strong stories struggle to build momentum. The result is more activity, but not always more confidence from families.
This is where re-anchoring–what we shared with you in our last newsletter–becomes practical.
Serialized storytelling doesn’t mean starting over. It means reshaping the system content sits inside: who holds the narrative thread, how enrollment, marketing, and leadership stay aligned, and where time is protected to develop stories that compound rather than reset.
The Rise of Fractional Leadership
Alongside this shift in storytelling, we’re seeing more schools, and organizations well beyond education, explore fractional marketing leadership.Not as a replacement for internal teams, but as a way to support the hardworking people already on the ground.
This shift also includes working with small, specialist agencies, where schools and organizations can tap into additional expertise and capacity without restructuring or adding permanent headcount. As expectations around engagement, content development, and responsiveness continue to rise, many internal teams are being asked to do more, often without more time or resources.
Done well, fractional leadership isn’t about bringing in one person to “take over.” It’s about providing extra sets of hands, senior perspective, and specialist skills that internal teams can draw on when needed. Increasingly, organizations are finding this model brings relief, momentum, and clarity, allowing existing teams to focus on what they do best, while accessing broader capability when demand peaks.
In many cases, fractional leadership and agency partnerships are becoming an economic solution for capacity, not a compromise–strengthening teams rather than stretching them thinner.
Shift #3 Is a Video Role Now a Non-Negotiable?
From routine to relevance. Many teams are still operating on routine and that’s normal. We do newsletters. We produce written content. We post static graphics. We repeat what’s familiar because it’s what the system supports.
But the question we’re hearing more often is: when do we stop and re-look at what’s actually working?
How are families consuming information now?
What are they spending time with?
What are they sharing?
What’s building trust and what’s simply filling up our social pages?
This is the audit we’re really talking about.
Not just what you’re producing, but how it’s landing. Are newsletters still being read? Are static posts gaining traction? Are we paying attention to resonance– shares, saves, comments, time spent on page–or just output volume?
A structural shift worth naming is how teams are reorganizing around engagement.
If video is now one of the strongest drivers of trust, familiarity, and enrollment confidence, should it be a non-negotiable capability inside school teams? And if the answer is yes, the harder question follows: what needs to change to make room for it because most teams aren’t adding headcount.
These aren’t content questions. They’re system questions.