The 2025-26 school budgeting season is here, allowing schools to align their spending with their strategic goals. For schools actively implementing strategic plans, this process becomes even more crucial in breaking down ambitious, time-sensitive objectives into actionable steps.
Founder + Lead Consultant, AKF Consulting
Across my 20+ years as a Marketing and Communications specialist, I’ve seen how marcomm work has shifted over time. Initially, marketing and communication departments did most of their work in house, hiring talented writers and PR experts. As new channels proliferated, particularly digital ones, the requirements for specialization grew and leaders recognized the need for external resources to deliver higher level work.
In the corporate world, consumer brands have long partnered with creative agencies, digital agencies, media planners, and social media experts. These brands rely on their marcomm teams to act as strategic architects, leveraging external vendors to deliver precise, results-oriented campaigns. Schools, too, can benefit from this approach, especially when managing brand reputation or increasing enrollment.
Strategic Budgeting with Digital Marketing
Schools with strong enrollment and high selectivity face the ongoing task of safeguarding their brand reputations among current families, alumni, and potential applicants. Conversely, schools looking to grow enrollment must explore innovative strategies to build demand. In both scenarios, digital marketing can play an essential role.
With the right strategy in place, schools can solidify and maintain a strong organic ranking with search engines, nurture current and prospective families with paid social media campaigns, and launch search ads that capture the attention of prospective families in precise, measurable ways.
Running effective digital marketing in-house can be done, but it’s rare for school marketing personnel to be focused on that alone. Many lack the bandwidth to analyze their data, making weekly adjustments while staying up-to-date with best practices. In some cases, schools have adapted to emerging trends by spreading marcomm responsibilities across faculty, administrators, and even parents. This model can lead to inconsistent messaging, diluted branding, and missed opportunities over time.
Prioritizing for Impact
Given tight budgets and small teams, how can schools realistically achieve their goals? Precision is key. Schools should focus on prioritizing initiatives, asking vendors for ROI-driven recommendations, and assessing which expenses are recurring versus one-time investments. For instance, a school may outsource high-skill tasks like SEO and paid search campaigns while keeping email communication or basic design work in-house.
Director of Marketing Innovation, Truth Tree
School MarComm teams are often comprised of passionate, multi-tasking powerhouses used to handling everything under the sun. As their roles continually expand and become more demanding, there’s an opportunity to grow the team or bring in the right external partner.
Marketing & Communications Investment Priorities
Here’s a simple tool to help guide your school’s marketing and communications budgeting decisions:
| Marketing & Communications Investment Priorities | |||||
| Priority* | In-House: MarComm Team | In-House: Collaboration | Outsource | Stop or Reduce | |
| Brand Strategy | |||||
| Message Creation | |||||
| Web / Technology | |||||
| Social Media | |||||
| SEO | |||||
| Email Campaigns | |||||
| Video / Photography | |||||
| Print / Direct Mail | |||||
| Digital Advertising | |||||
| Non-digital Advertising | |||||
| Hospitality | |||||
| And more… | |||||
Source: AKF Consulting, LLC
* Allocate 100 pennies across each to force trade-offs. More pennies means higher priority. Total=100.
The Role of Strategic MarComm Leadership
An encouraging trend in the education industry is the rise of more strategic Marketing and Communications directors. These leaders bring the expertise needed to prioritize effectively, direct vendors strategically, and maintain control of their school’s brand. Digital marketing complements these efforts by providing data-driven tools to optimize campaigns and measure their success.
By finding the right mix of in-house efforts and vendor partnerships, schools can run multiple initiatives simultaneously and significantly amplify their impact each year.
As you assess your budget for the upcoming school year, try identifying the best ways to invest in strategies that align with your school’s goals.
Ayesha Flaherty is the founder and lead consultant at AKF Consulting, a firm helping independent schools grow and thrive through strategic marketing and communications. She combines 20+ years of related experience from her time in independent school administration, corporate marketing and change management consulting. Her approach is to be crystal clear on priorities and goals, and to have a deep understanding of audience needs and motivations, so the work of her clients is strategic and long-lasting.
Missy Speyrer came to Truth Tree after 8 years at an independent school in South Louisiana. From branding and marketing to social media and auxiliary programs, she is no stranger to working alongside a lean team to get too much done in too little time.
Ready to Take Your Marketing to the Next Level?
AKF Consulting offers a tailored and attentive experience, along with a model for marketing and communications that helps schools connect their strategy, brand, team and execution.
Truth Tree provides digital marketing strategies and solutions for schools looking to elevate their digital visibility with searching families.
Reach out to see what our two teams could dream up for you and your school.
