
Hosted by Cheryl Broom · EN
Join host and CEO of GradComm, Cheryl Broom as she sits down with higher education experts to discuss trends in marketing, communications, advancement and student success.

Is your marketing really working, or are you just measuring the wrong thing? In this episode of Higher Ed Conversations, GradComm CEO Cheryl Broom sits down with Jeff Greenfield, CEO of Provalytics, to tackle one of the biggest challenges in higher ed marketing: proving ROI in a world obsessed with clicks.For years, marketers have relied on clicks as the gold standard. But Greenfield argues that overemphasizing last-click attribution has led institutions to misallocate billions in ad spend, often cutting the very channels that are filling their enrollment funnel. If you’re tired of defending your budget with incomplete data and want a smarter way to connect marketing to inquiry and enrollment growth, this conversation will change how you measure success.What You’ll Learn:Why clicks may be the most overrated metric in marketingHow attention and impressions drive awareness (and eventually applications)The hidden “carryover effect” of advertisingThe danger of shiny object syndrome in higher edHow predictive modeling and incrementality testing can help you move from guesswork to proofThanks for listening!Connect with GradComm:Instagram: @gradcommunicationsFacebook: @GradCommunicationsLinkedIn: @gradcommSend us a message: GradComm.comHigher Ed Conversations is hosted by Cheryl Broom, CEO of GradComm, a marketing and branding agency specializing in community colleges and public education.

Student search behavior has changed dramatically, and if your college isn’t showing up in AI answers, your prospective students may never find you. Why? Today’s students are using generative AI as the starting point of their college search, often long before they ever visit a college website. In this quick-take episode, Cheryl Broom, CEO of GradComm, explores what happens when prospective students ask AI tools like ChatGPT questions such as “What college has the best nursing program near me?” or “What is student life like at this college?”This episode unpacks how AI search tools work, what sources they pull from, and why visibility today is about more than traditional SEO. Cheryl introduces the concept of being “understandable” to AI and highlights the growing importance of a college’s full digital footprint, from websites and FAQs to reviews, social media, and third-party platforms like Reddit and Wikipedia. Because in this new search landscape, visibility is no longer just about ranking. It’s about being understood.What You’ll Learn:How AI search tools actually work and where they pull information fromWhat colleges should be doing right now to ensure their websites increase discoverability on AI platformsWhy it’s important for colleges to run their own AI searchesHow colleges can write content that answers real student questions Thanks for listening!Connect with GradComm:Instagram: @gradcommunicationsFacebook: @GradCommunicationsLinkedIn: @gradcommSend us a message: GradComm.comHigher Ed Conversations is hosted by Cheryl Broom, CEO of GradComm, a marketing and branding agency specializing in community colleges and public education.