General 1 — elliot paige

Miami University
Esports Recruitment

Branding / Marketing Strategy Development / Brochure Design

Client

Miami University’s Esports Team

Goal

Build awareness of the Miami esports team for high school gamers and recruit them to join

Strategy

We created material that would target prospective players at different stages of their consideration of attending Miami and/or joining the team

Client Needs:

The client came with no pre-existing structure in terms of recruitment, so we started by doing research and identifying what significant improvements we could make in the short time frame provided to us. The touch points were then organized into three categories: outbound, inbound, and direct contact.

Starting with outbound material, each touchpoint would be designed to encourage prospective players to interact with the team more, with the ultimate goal being direct conversation between prospective players and active members of the team.

Step 1: Reasearch and General Recommendations

Targeted Emails

We talked to Campus Admissions and learned that most varsity teams at Miami use targeted emails for recruitment. As this was cost effective and could be specifically triggered by visiting Miami webpages related to esports, we recommended the client begin utilizing this avenue.
Campus Visits

Since we were focused on reaching prospective players, we talked to Campus Admissions about their tours. We pitched to the client that campus tours could be adjusted so that when they went through the Armstrong Student Center, they could walk by the esports arena.
Discord Plan

Since discord is widely accessible and easy to superintend, a plan was written up for how to best utilize the discord and one-on-one communication once prospective players have joined the discord.

Step 2: Website Updates

Suggestions for Team Page

For the Miami Esports website, we pitched that a page to be added that would be used for recruitment and put together an interest form that could be coded in to be apart of that page once the new design was implemented.

Esports Page on Miami Sports Website

Miami University has a pre-existing website for all of their varsity teams except for the esports team, so we pitched to the client that they should go to the university directly to be have an esports page added. I took the website’s layout and mocked up what the esports page would look like.

Step 3: Brochure Design

Since the esports team had a limited budget, we knew that we would have to have a good pitch on when, where, and how a printed touch point would be used. We researched how other varsity teams and Miami as a school markets themselves to high schoolers and decided to make a brochure. The brochure would be made available in front of Miami’s esports arena and would be taken to the conventions/events that Miami esports representatives already attend (such as Ohayocon).

First Iteration

At the beginning of designing the brochure, the information was written to promote attending Miami as much as it promoted the esports team; the thought was that since Miami doesn’t currently provide scholarships, its academic excellence should be presented as a larger part of the marketing.

Second Iteration

At this point, the branding was still being developed, but I was able to apply fonts and filler images to give the brochure a more designed feel. This step also came with some change to the information, with the academic information being changed to be about esports-related majors and certificates.

Third Iteration

Once the branding and messaging team had finalized the new look and tone of the team, I was able to update the brochure from their feedback; any generalized statistics of Miami’s academics was replaced with information about the esports team, more content was added about the new esports arena, and the overall design was brought up to date.