With AI as an accelerant, marketing is evolving at a breakneck pace, and brands are being challenged to maintain authenticity while scaling globally. How do you build a cohesive, authentic brand identity across diverse markets, cultures, and digital platforms—all while leveraging AI-driven personalization?
Joining me today is Emily Ward, VP of Global Marketing at Turnitin, a leading edtech brand focused on academic integrity and student success. Emily has spent more than 15 years in the education space, shaping marketing strategies for institutions under the Laureate Education network, leading global marketing at Anthology (formerly Blackboard), and now overseeing the global marketing strategy at Turnitin.
About Emily Ward
Emily Ward has spent more than 15 years focused on the education space, initially generating enrollments for a broad portfolio of global institutions under the Laureate Education network. She then moved to Blackboard, since acquired by Anthology, working with non-profit academic institutions to better understand how to leverage their marketing investment in order to positively impact enrollments and institutional growth.
Over time, Emily’s focus expanded to the larger concept of Student Success, helping academic leadership connect the dots of the full student experience from decision making through to matriculation and beyond. During the pandemic, Emily pivoted quickly to lead the launch of an official eCommerce platform, and was soon pulled in to lead North America then Global Marketing efforts for the newly formed EdTech giant Anthology.
Today, she oversees global marketing for Turnitin, an academic integrity company focused on supporting educators and empowering students around the world to do their best original work. Emily holds a B.S. from Towson University and an M.B.A from Loyola University Maryland. She resides near Washington, DC with her daughter.
Resources
Turnitin: https://www.turnitin.com
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Transcript
Greg Kihlstrom (00:01)
With AI as an accelerant, marketing is evolving at a breakneck pace and brands are being challenged to maintain authenticity while scaling globally. How do you build a cohesive, authentic brand identity across diverse markets, cultures and digital platforms, all while leveraging AI-driven personalization? Joining me today is Emily Ward, VP of Global Marketing at Turnitin, a leading ed tech brand focused on academic integrity and student success.
Emily has spent more than 15 years in the education space, shaping marketing strategies for institutions under the Laureate Education Network, leading global marketing at Anthology, formerly Blackboard, and now overseeing the global marketing strategy at Turnitin. Emily, welcome to the show.
Emily Ward (01:36)
Thanks for having me, Greg. It’s great to be here.
Greg Kihlstrom (01:38)
Yeah, looking forward to talking about this with you. Before we dive in though, why don’t you start by sharing a little bit about your background and how you arrived at Turnitin.
Emily Ward (01:46)
Yeah, happy to. So I’ve worked across actually a number of different industries, including insurance, mortgages, and even golf, if you can imagine, where I transitioned into education to focus on helping to support students in the journey of making essentially their life goals a reality. This is one of the most important decisions that I think any person can make if this is something that’s available to you. So I was very compelled to use my experience and expertise for such a meaningful opportunity.
I did start an education working in the for-profit sector, marketing a variety of global institutions under the Laureate Education umbrella. So this was a great exposure to help better understand the inner workings at the institutional level, really understanding how and why decisions are made within the institution. This actually led to an opportunity at Blackboard under their quickly growing, but little known student service and success division to drive enrollments for nonprofit universities.
which tend to have more limited marketing budgets and resources than the larger for-profits. And there I developed a marketing performance solution to actually help drive tangible ROI for institutions, helping them move to more modern marketing strategies and techniques, really driven by data and focused more on the digital environment where we can better track and understand the impact of marketing dollars. From there, I quickly moved into business development as the solution SME and then COVID came and found myself quickly pivoting to help explore and launch e-commerce solutions across the entire company. That eventually moved into taking on the lead of marketing in North America. And then we merged with Anthology a few years back. And I moved into leading global demand gen for the entire organization. And then I guess most recently in how I arrived at Turnitin is jumping at this opportunity just shortly after the launch of ChatGPT where it was pretty clear that the role of generative AI would be an important defining topic for the education industry, looking across all the key stakeholders.
Greg Kihlstrom (03:41)
Great, great. Well, yeah, definitely. You’re a great person to talk about this this topic here. So let’s let’s dive in and want to start by we’re to talk about a few things here. But, you know, I wanted to start by talking about building a global brand identity and and what that what that looks like. Now, you mentioned a lot of the, know, whether it’s A.I. or other other trends certainly factoring into what it means to create a brand and maintain one.
What are you seeing as some of the biggest challenges in building a cohesive and authentic brand identity across global markets?
Emily Ward (04:15)
Yeah, I mean, I think saying true to a brand that’s been around for more than 25 years while also honoring the nuances of each of the regions and markets around the globe has certainly been a challenge. mean, both are very important, but an organization is not going to experience success without both in play.
Greg Kihlstrom (04:33)
Yeah, yeah. So could you give us a little insight on, how does turn it in, adapt messaging for for some of these different regions while staying true to that core mission?
Emily Ward (04:44)
Yeah, yeah, this is where I think our regional marketers are key. So many of them in market where they’re really ensuring that they are aligned to our mission and vision of turning it in, but also intimately knowing and understanding their markets and what’s going to resonate with them. So they’re really the key to adapting our core message for each region or territory, and then ensuring that we’re meeting the specific needs of that area and catering to the way that they research, learn and ultimately engage with the solution. So our relationship with the sales team is also pretty key here as they really have their fingers on the pulse of what’s happening in any given part of the world where we actively listen for learnings and feedback to help shape and optimize our marketing plans and activities as well as how we’re going to position in the particular market.
Greg Kihlstrom (05:27)
Yeah. And certainly, you know, across your career, you know, not only in the in the education space, but in the other industries you’ve seen, certainly you’ve seen some some missteps from, you know, whether it’s competitors or other brands. You know, what are what are some missteps that brands can make when they’re trying to, you know, best intentions, but trying to scale their their brand globally?
Emily Ward (05:47)
Yeah, I mean, the world is big and time is certainly of the essence when you’re scaling globally where I think it’s really important to strike the balance between strategy and agility. So again, being in tune and lockstep with your sales team and encouraging really customer centric focus are key. Where sales again is at that frontline conversing with the customer’s daily where relationship is critical to customer centricity.
And within education specifically, there are actually a number of different views on any given topic where there’s certainly a common thread, but we have to be mindful of who we’re speaking to and what their specific point of view is, since there are many different perspectives that are typically involved in the decision-making process when it comes to education. yeah, internally, we are really looking at alignment across marketing functions. It’s a pretty big priority for us globally where customers stay just more than ever any consistency, right? In that crowded world of marketing messages that are coming from companies of all types. So if you’re not structured appropriately, you’re moving too fast and the team isn’t aligned with the core vision for your brand, your messaging is quickly gonna become disjointed, fragmented, where you end up showing up differently in each market and that’s certainly not what anyone wants. And I think it’s also interesting when you’re kind of based out of any given location, it can be pretty easy to deploy messaging and strategies that may not be appropriate for markets outside of your organization’s comfort zone. So really having that global perspective and demonstrating that and connecting that with your customers is key for success. And then of course, I would say generative AI is obviously making it easier to move from concept to execution much faster, which is pretty attractive as we’re looking to scale.
Greg Kihlstrom (07:24)
Yeah, and to follow on to that, you know, certainly I, you know, I think when a lot of people think about scaling, they’re like, you know, yay, I and certainly I’ve seen a lot of the benefits that it can provide, you know, as you just mentioned as well. But, you know, there’s also a lot of concern about doing it right and, you know, scaling it in a way that it’s not just more content, but it’s also on on brand and that that that brand identity remains genuine.
How do you, you what would be your guidance to brands that are, again, they know they need to scale. They don’t have necessarily the bandwidth to scale with their human workforce. So they need a little augmentation, but their brand is their brand. You know, they’ve got to keep it, keep it genuine. What would your recommendations be there?
Emily Ward (08:10)
Yeah, I mean, I think this kind of really resonates for us to turn it in because original and critical thinking are at the core of what we do. So this is an opportunity for us to drink our own champagne, so to speak, where we still need creativity in what we do and that original thought, but AI can help us amplify the stories that we’re trying to tell. So my team is absolutely encouraged to explore generative AI, but not without respecting our brand look and feel.
the tone of voice and the audiences that we’re serving. We also make a point of clarifying that human touch is an absolute bust for anything being generated by AI, where we need to remind everyone that we are the keepers of our brand and not the technology. We review, edit, fact check anything that’s created by AI just to ensure that it aligns with our standards before it goes out the door.
Greg Kihlstrom (08:56)
I want to talk more specifically kind of on the thread of AI. I want to talk about how AI is reshaping marketing specifically in the EdTech space. I mean, you’ve you’ve certainly seen, you know, been in roles outside of the industry, but certainly seen EdTech in a number of your roles. How do you see it? Like, are there specifics to EdTech that you think are relevant as far as how AI is reshaping it?
Emily Ward (09:26)
I mean, specific to what we’re doing, there’s this interesting challenge around the usefulness of the generative AI, but again, going back to that original thought process, where how do you make sure that folks are learning, that they’re absorbing, that they are able to create original thought and creative thought without relying too heavily on AI, and just using it as a go-to tool? I think you wanna make sure that whatever we’re doing in terms of producing students that are really understanding, comprehending the material, able to contribute to the workforce and to the world, we need to be careful of the usage of generative AI. And so what we’re really looking at is how are we building this into the process of what’s happening and how are we not looking at generative AI as just bad, but as an opportunity for, again, teaching folks how to use it in an effective and efficient way that doesn’t…put their original and creative thinking at stake.
Greg Kihlstrom (10:20)
Yeah, yeah. Well, I guess along the lines of, you know, potential concerns with AI usage, there’s certainly, you know, potential ethical concerns. There’s a lot of talk about that in early. I would say early days of like chat, TV, TV’s popularity and stuff like that. But still, you know, a lot of continuing talk about those things. How can marketing teams ensure responsible AI use while still, you know, continuing to use it?
Emily Ward (10:47)
Yeah, I think responsible AI use is definitely top of mind these days, since we’re working with educators who want to ensure that students are still developing essential analytical and cognitive abilities by publishing AI as a resource to enhance, right, rather than substitute student learning. So that takes us back to that concept. I keep going back to it, but original and critical thinking where we can use AI to accelerate and not generate original thought. Also, I think transparency is really key. So we know that marketing teams everywhere are exploring with AI just to help move faster and more efficiently. And it’s really important that our audiences are clear on this approach, particularly for turn it in, right, and what we do, which includes being mindful of their personal data and not using it in a way that exploits or takes advantage of their PII or personally identifiable, excuse me,
Greg Kihlstrom (11:34)
Yeah, yeah. And so, you know, another part of this, I guess, from the from the customer side of this is I’m a big believer in using personalization. And I think AI is a major way to augment that and make it even more powerful. But, you know, some customers like personalization and there’s certainly statistics to prove that. And yet maybe there’s a line that gets crossed where it feels intrusive or invasive or something. How do you look at that? I guess that line of how much is too much or how do you guide teams to finding that right balance?
Emily Ward (12:12)
Yeah, I personally, I think what you called out is really important for me. I want to not be too intrusive or get too friendly, especially when you think about the audience and kind of the academic atmosphere, right? And how folks are kind of thinking and feeling where I think getting too personal too quickly can be potentially a mistake. I mean, I do think we want to understand our audience. We want to understand what’s driving them. So I look at more personalizing to the information that we know around, right, what’s driving them? What are the biggest challenges? What problems are they looking to solve for? Just engaging them in that conversation where you can kind of develop that relationship and get to a place where really I would love for, you know, once you have that personal connection and they kind of raise their hands and say, you know, I’m really ready for a deeper conversation and to explore this together where we can leave it to even our sales teams or our development reps to have those deeper conversations in terms of personalization. So, and I’ve also seen, you know, folks get it wrong, unfortunately, with the personalization aspect. And I think there’s a little bit of a danger there. So to me, it’s more about really deeply understanding the customer, tailoring their experiences, being very clear on what their customer buying journey looks like, and then kind of serving up relevant content, rather than, you know, getting too specific again, and being too intrusive where it may be a potential turn off to them in the whole research and decision making process.
Greg Kihlstrom (13:32)
Yeah, yeah. Well, and so along those lines in the talking about the customer journey, I want to talk a little bit about your experiences and the best practices that you’ve seen in acquisition as well as retention. What best practices should brands follow for customer acquisition when things obviously increasingly digital first?
Emily Ward (13:56)
Yeah, I mean, so again, I think starts with knowing your audiences, like really knowing them, understanding those buying journeys and purchase paths I just mentioned. And then you’re going to want to think about the various digital channels that you have available to you and how each of them plays a pretty distinct and important role in covering the full buyer journey and making sure you have coverage of all of it. And then
Incorporating value for me at every connection point, it seems like such an obvious kind of thing, right? In the world of marketing, but it’s like every time you touch base with somebody is an opportunity to add value. I’ve been plant the seed, build a trust with your organization and with yourself, right? So that you’re giving them this valuable experience from beginning to end. And then once you have kind of all of that foundation in place, I think AI can really help you further refine and execute on the experiences that your customers are having. For me, I think
Data is really important, right? You need to use that to inform your decision-making process whenever it’s available, as much as it’s available. And then if I had to pick a final one, I would just quickly insert just testing, right? Test, test, test again. What you think may be true may not be. And what once was true may no longer be true. So things are evolving extremely quickly and always throughout the world, right? But it’s very important to be actively testing your working theories.
Greg Kihlstrom (15:14)
Yeah, yeah. And I love what you just said about, what once was true may not always be true, because I do think in testing, you know, it takes it takes a little bit of extra effort rather than just moving on to the next thing. But we tend to get stuck in that anecdotal of, well, you know, we don’t use orange because the color that one test three years ago that used the color orange didn’t work. So orange must not work. You know, there’s obviously lots of things in the world change over over time and things gets, you know, whatever bias that whether that’s anchor bias or whatever, whichever kind of bias that is, things get stuck. So I think your point about continual testing is so true. I also want to talk about the retention part of things as well. And, certainly there’s depending on the org that that someone sits in, you know, there can be often be a lot of attention paid to acquisition. But, you know, retention is, you know,
Emily Ward (15:55)
Yeah, absolutely.
Greg Kihlstrom (16:11)
just as important and can often provide long-term lifetime value and things like that. How do you look at keeping customers engaged in the long-term? What do you recommend for strategies for retention?
Emily Ward (16:23)
Yeah, I think we’re very fortunate to have a high customer retention rate here at Turnitin. And I think product market is a great start, right? But you have to continue adding value beyond the sales. So we look at things like what’s coming down the pike that will make our customers’ jobs easier or the work that they do more effective. Are there macro or micro trends that are emerging that we can help anticipate to to help our customers stay ahead of the game and things like how do we service and engage our customers above and beyond asking for a renewal, right? There are just other value adds that you can bring into the mix. So it’s important that we’re kind of mindful of all of these things to make sure that we’re keeping our customers engaged.
Greg Kihlstrom (17:07)
Yeah, yeah, definitely. And you kind of touched on this, but you know, the customer feedback and engagement data, similar to the ongoing testing, how do you look at that for, you know, continuous improvement and refinement of strategies?
Emily Ward (17:21)
Yeah, I I love data and data is king or queen. I will slice and dice a spreadsheet if I have to, right? If that’s what’s available to me to get to the data that supports any decision that we make, whether it’s to identify customer trends, to inform strategy, or if we’re reviewing marketing metrics to optimize and identify potential areas of improvement in the campaigns that we’re running.
Closely tracking those final metrics really enables you to identify potential issues arising at each stage of the prospect and customer experience, which you can then use to help engage and connect with other areas within the business to have critical conversations. I we use data to better understand everything from brand affinity and customer engagement to whether or not we should turn a keyword on or off when it comes to our search engine strategy. again, data has to inform everything that we do for sure.
Greg Kihlstrom (18:12)
Yeah, absolutely. Well, Emily, thanks so much for joining today. One last question before we wrap up. I’d to ask this to everybody. What do you do to stay agile in your role and how do you find a way to do it consistently?
Emily Ward (18:23)
Yeah, that’s a great question. mean, obviously agility is key in marketing. I think I serve as the mediator between our company vision and our teams who are working in alignment of the strategy and execution. So it seems pretty simple, but communication and really effective communication is key. I’ve just spent so many years in marketing, seeing time and time again where the left hand is just doing one thing and the right is doing another. And it’s just important to be the glue that holds everything together.
And then I tried to couple that with actively monitoring industry trends and education, marketing, go-to market in general, to make sure that I’m staying ahead of the game and making sure that my teams are also keeping pace. I’m just not a big fan of needing to reinvent the wheel. So I like to use my networks and platforms like LinkedIn to serve strategies and techniques that can help make a pretty significant difference in the way that we’re operating as an organization. And then the last that I’ll give is that I just do find it’s important to be connected with other leaders across the organization to ensure alignment, not just within marketing, but across all areas, as they’re ultimately going to have an impact on customer experience and marketing success.
