by Dan Gayle
Associate Editor

I dreamt last night that I attended an awesome college in the Pacific Northwest.

The school was renowned for its professionally recognized Automotive and Manufacturing department, its nursing and dental hygiene programs, and its top-notch music technology programs. It was well-regarded as a decent general education transfer school too.

Wait a second...Isn’t that what Shoreline Community College already is?

All of the above is true, but you’d never know it from the advertising and promotional materials the school plasters all over the backsides of Metro buses.

The school’s rallying cry that is emblazoned across Seattle’s public transportation: “Get closer to your dreams!”

Yeah! Why not?! I want to get closer to my dreams, and frolic with the daisies (La la la ti da...)!

Maybe I can fly like an eagle!

All of this, and more at Shoreline Community College!

What kind of baloney is that, “Get closer to your dreams?”

Unless you somehow manage to get Drew Barrymore to fall in love with me, and teach me to cook a T-Bone steak on my personal yacht sailing the South Pacific, I don’t think you’re getting me any closer to my dreams.

But seriously, folks, how does our school plan on bringing back students to SCC with an advertising campaign like that?

It’s so bland and generic that you could apply it to tuna fish. Get closer to your dreams...eat tuna.

Or what about photography? Get closer to your dreams... photograph Drew Barrymore.

The lame slogan ignores one of the first rules of branding as stated in the book, Why Johnny Can’t Brand: Rediscovering the Lost Art of the Big Idea. It doesn’t state the school’s dominant selling idea—the combination of our school’s unique name, and our specialty that makes us #1 in the mind of the customer, students.

Be #1 in something and promote the heck out of it. It doesn’t matter what you’re #1 in, because it’s a sliding scale. You can totally just pick any old point, as long as you’re #1 in it.

Let’s try a few:
• “Shoreline Community College: The Best Place to be a Dolphin and not get laughed at (too hard)”
• “Shoreline Community College: Get Closer to Your Taco Cart”
• “Shoreline Community College: The Best Community College in the 98133, yo,” or,
• “Shoreline Community College: A Small School for a Large Education”

Now it’s your turn. Find something that you think SCC is #1 at, and shout it out loud. Disregard the quizzical stares of your friends standing next to you as you read this. Shout it out loud! If it’s a good one, your friends, and the strangers around you will pick it up as an SCC rallying cry, and it will spread like wildfire across the city, the state, and the nation.

The waves of goodwill that your new catch-phrase will generate will get students streaming into the classrooms overnight, evening sessions added to those lame 7:30 a.m. daily classes.
It’s easy, really. Just about anything that says: Hey you. Yeah you, with the goatee. You should check us out. We’re cheap, good, and local. Why wouldn’t you go here? We’ve got everything you need, and a few things you probably didn’t even know about.

I had a dream last night. I dreamt that SCC was a decent school that was #1 in a lot of areas locally, and even nationally. It was also a good place to get a decent, well-rounded general education. And then I woke up and realized it wasn’t a dream.

This is reality, and our school’s marketing and promotions should reflect that.