Marine GALHAUT–REDOU
Initial training and media relations marketing manager
Following a year full of developments, there are many challenges for the new Marketing & Communication Department. By re-prioritizing its targets and giving new meaning to all its actions, Audencia is giving itself the means to achieve these ambitious objectives.
Arnaud FOURNIER
Marketing & Communication Director
23
The number of students recruited as ambassadors on Audencia’s social networks to represent our programs.
How would you assess 2023?
We are emerging from a transitional year with the creation of the Marketing & Brand Strategy Department as well as a challenging context (both in-house and externally) which enabled us to consider Audencia’s strengths and, above all, its stakes in relation to a fast-changing business sector and increasing competition. It is this combination of ideas that has enabled us to finalize the organization designed to achieve Audencia’s ambitious goals.
With the recent creations of the Marketing & Communication Department as well as the Commercial and French & International Admissions Department, the aim is to support the switch in internal culture towards a more marketing and sales-oriented vision. It also seeks to reposition our applicants, students and corporate partners at the center of our marketing and communication strategies.
Some major achievements already embody this paradigm shift: the new audencia.com web site, which made it possible to get rid of the silos that were the former web sites (26 sites and 50,000 pages) to create a single site aimed primarily at our target audience of applicants; there is also the redesign of our graphical identity for all our marketing materials. There are two key directions here: a more modern approach and a repositioning of our customers at the center of our communications.
What are the CSR commitments that guide your actions?
In 2023, we took a number of steps forward in terms of our Department’s CSR impact, for example by discontinuing the offering of goodies, launching invitations to tender for printing, events or redesigning our web site to include accessibility issues for people with disabilities. The work initiated in recent months must be continued and implemented in the short to medium term.
What are your objectives for 2024?
Our department’s main objective for the coming year is to continue to support the cultural and organizational changes initiated in 2023. This new department must therefore enable us to pursue the ambitious objectives of our school in France and abroad with confidence, to support our development in Paris and to allow the Audencia brand to emerge as an innovative and attractive player in an increasingly opaque sector of activity in which it is sometimes difficult to find a way around. Following 2023, in which Audencia, its employees and also its values could have been called into question, it is also important to us to give value back to the people that make up Audencia and to give meaning to all our actions. Through sharing a clear vision, we will be able to collectively enable our school to grow.
What is the one word that defines the strategic direction of your actions between now and the end of the ECOS 2025 strategic plan?
If I had to choose just one word, I would say Challenge – we are entering a strategic phase, linked both to our ambitions for growth (such as the new Paris campus, new programs and international expansion) and to the challenges of cultural change. These challenges are particularly exciting for us and if we manage to meet them, we will have all the keys we need going forwards, with ambition and serenity.
A new source of motivation
“In recent months, with the creation of the Marketing & Communication Department, our way of thinking and our methods have been changing: they are now more focused on the needs and interests of our customers, throughout their courses, in order to create the best possible experience for them. Initially as the Head of Marketing and Media Relations for initial education and more recently as the Head of the Product Management Unit for our entire program portfolio, this paradigm change has had an impact on everything I do, whether defining our action plans, media strategy, the search for new partners, performance analysis and monitoring, etc. All this helps to give more meaning to my job, while adding real value to my expertise. It is a new source of motivation for me but also for the teams!”
