Case Study: East Tennessee State University achieves job-ready digital marketers and increased recruitment with Adobe Target

ETSU cultivates future digital marketers

East Tennessee State University faced a challenge: attract more students and boost recruitment without diverting budget or staff from its educational mission, while preparing graduates for the growing demand for skilled digital marketers. To tackle this, the university built an interdisciplinary Master of Arts in Brand and Media Strategy that teaches industry software — including Adobe Target as part of Adobe Experience Cloud (alongside Adobe Analytics and Adobe Experience Manager) — so students gain real‑world personalization, testing, and analytics skills.

ETSU integrated Adobe Target and other Adobe Experience Cloud tools into coursework and agency‑style capstone projects (with partner R2Integrated), letting students build, test, and measure live marketing programs for the university. The result: experiential learning drove strong program growth (graduate enrollment rose from 24 to more than 75 in a year), supplemented university marketing capacity with trained student workers, created an employer pipeline for graduates, and produced measurable increases in recruitment and student engagement — all enabled by Adobe Target and the broader Adobe Experience Cloud.

East Tennessee State University

Stephen Marshall

Department Chair, Media and Communication Department