Creative Talk with Allan Wrath

This month, we speak with Allan Wrath of Hillcrest Christian College, Queensland.  Allan is an Art Director/Designer turned Marketing and Content Manager.  Allan guides us through the changes his career has undertaken and offers us valuable insight into the lessons learnt on the way.

Allan, tell us about the journey to your current role.

In Jan 2025, I finally made the move to Queensland at the same time as returning to full-time work after a 2-year stint working as an art director in an in-house role.

You started your career as a graphic designer in advertising. Looking back, what lessons from agency life still shape the way you work today?

Yes, I remember it well. Back in 2012, I threw caution to the wind and went full-time freelance. The Creative Store placed me in my first gig at Draft Advertising Agency, laying up ads on the Thursday before Easter, and I remember thinking, 'Damn, this place is fast-paced.' At the same time, I was building my career as an illustrator, so ad agencies quickly became my new best friends.

What prompted the move from agency life into education marketing?

After 20+ years as a creative, I’ve seen the industry shift from print to digital, social media, and now AI. I recently had a creative director call me “old school” for supplying a scamp, which made me laugh, but it also highlighted how quickly some of the process and craft were disappearing. Last year, I felt it was the right time to pivot and bring together my experience in creative thinking, design, strategy and storytelling in a broader leadership role, and education marketing felt like a great place to do that.

What's surprised you most about working in education marketing?

There’s always something happening and plenty of great content to capture for socials. Hillcrest is incredible at producing talented humans, and Hillcrest has done that time and again. It gives us the opportunity to capture memorable moments and turn them into stories that build the school’s brand.

What's one design principle you believe every marketer should understand?

This is a difficult question. There are so many ingredients that go into clear communication. My advice is to spend the time understanding clear visual composition. If it looks right, then it probably is right.

What type of content consistently performs better than expected?

The content that gets the best engagement is usually the content that speaks to the whole College community. Whether its students performing in a show or giving it their all at an athletics carnival, people connect with seeing our students doing what they love and doing it well.

Beyond likes and views, what tells you a campaign has truly been successful?

School life has a natural rhythm — term by term, year by year. If we can create a campaign that carries through those seasons and still feels relevant and valued, then we’ve done a great job of connecting the history of the school with where it’s heading next.

Which platform has surprised you the most in terms of engagement?

No surprises here, Facebook seems to carry the heavy lifting throughout our social channels. Everyone's mum, dad and nana is on FB.

AI is changing marketing at an incredible pace. What's one way it's genuinely improved your work - and one thing you hope it never replaces?

AI has definitely made parts of the process faster, particularly when it comes to exploring ideas and getting things moving. But I hope it never replaces emotionally driven creative direction. I still want work that makes me laugh, cry or feel something — I want to feel connected to a person’s creative craft

How are you using AI in your content workflow today?

AI helps immensely. I’ve inherited about five years’ worth of another team’s filing, so Copilot is great for finding content buried in years of files. It also helps with creative writing for social media and proofreading large print and digital documents. We produce a 280-page yearbook with more than 30 contributors, so having AI help pick up grammatical errors and inconsistencies is incredibly useful.

What's something your younger designer self would be surprised you're doing today?

I was such a purist for so long. I would be shocked to see myself on the ‘suit’ side of the agency.

Do you find that being located in Reedy Creek inhibits your ability to source creative and freelance talent?

The Creative Store has been amazing at presenting a heap of talented freelancers available for remote hire. Locally, there is not a lot of industry for creatives here on the Gold Coast, but this has not been an issue.