UNLV ad campaign to target regional students

Cathy Scott

Wednesday, June 3, 1998 | 10:25 a.m.

UNLV's marketing department is about to launch its first-ever comprehensive ad campaign to try and improve the school's image and attract new students.

The campaign, which will kick off in July, will be local as well as regional, said Lynette Boggs McDonald, director of UNLV's marketing and community relations department.

"We'll target key regional markets, such as Phoenix," Boggs McDonald said. "We're trying to enhance the image generally for the university. UNLV is trying to position itself more regionally as opposed to just locally.

"We're trying to move to the next level, so that we will go into the same applicant pool, such as Arizona State and California State and increase incentives for kids to consider us as their university of choice."

Budgeted for this year's campaign is $100,000, with an additional $100,000 for next year, Boggs McDonald said. TV, radio and print ads begin running next month, she said. Thomas Puckett Advertising is handling the campaign.

"We've done some extensive market research to reach those prospective students we need to target," Boggs McDonald said. "This is the very first comprehensive marketing campaign that the university has ever launched."

Three years ago the university, which has a current enrollment of about 20,000 students, launched an ad campaign, but it was not a comprehensive one, and TV ads were done using donated air time, she said.

A research firm, based in San Francisco, conducted a thousand-person telephone survey of Clark County residents.

"We're using information we gleaned from that survey for this ad campaign," she said.

That information includes targeting students who have completed two years at a community college, minorities and also those who already hold undergraduate degrees but want to earn masters and doctorates.