EdTech marketing is hard right now.
Harder than most.
EdTech is a specific focus at Kickstand, where we’ve worked with brands to help them cut through a tough market. Marketing leaders in EdTech are 93% more likely than average to report a negative impact on their business right now. The ones cutting through aren’t spending more — they’re showing up differently.
EdTech brands we’ve helped
cut through.
Founded in Europe, Brainly needed to enter the U.S. market with a story that resonated with three audiences at once — students, parents, and educators — while raising capital.
Built Brainly’s first U.S. brand narrative for each audience plus investors, developed student stories that could carry media attention, and grew a spokesperson bench across users, parents, and educators.
The Results
Higher-ed AI platform competing in a category where most coverage was in low-authority trades. No clear leader voice. No competitive moat in earned media.
Built a rapid-response media program that paired Ivy.ai’s higher-education data with thought leadership from the executive bench — placing the company in business and tech publications competitors weren’t reaching.
The Results
Learning tech platform serving higher education and enterprise needed to evolve beyond a one-time acquisition announcement (of Elai) into a sustained narrative on the future of AI-enabled learning.
Repositioned Panopto from “acquired company” to category leader — elevating AI-forward future-of-learning narratives, securing vertical bylines, and building a customer-story engine that demonstrated real-world impact.
The Results
Nursing-education simulation platform competing in a crowded EdTech market while nursing programs nationally faced record burnout and staffing shortages. Needed to be heard above generic VR-training pitches.
Built timely, impact-driven storytelling that connected UbiSim to the bigger conversations — nursing shortages, tech adoption, STEM equity, and VR’s role in clinical empathy. Localized national narratives. Surfaced real outcomes.
The Results
The pressure is real. The data backs it up.
The EdTech-specific cut from our Q1 CMO Pulse tells a story most agencies aren’t equipped to address.
of EdTech leaders report the current administration is having a negative impact on their business — significantly more than other verticals.
Q1 CMO Pulse, 2026
B2B tech marketing leaders are already behind on plan heading into Q2.
Q1 CMO Pulse, 2026
are behind on brand awareness and share of voice — the channel that compounds slowest when you fall behind.
Q1 CMO Pulse, 2026
Well-resourced teams are twice as likely to be significantly ahead of plan. The fault line isn’t effort — it’s resourcing alignment.
Q1 CMO Pulse, 2026
Two questions every EdTech
marketing team is trying to answer.
How do we drive brand influence?
Decision-makers in EdTech buying committees need as many as 80 touchpoints across media, peers, analysts, and original content before they form a preference. A blog post and a paid ad don’t get there.
How do we win findability in an AI world?
71.5% of people now use AI tools to search for information. If your brand isn’t documented, validated, and cited across the web, you’re invisible to the buyers asking ChatGPT or Perplexity “what’s the best platform for [your category]?”
Earned media still matters.
The map around it just got bigger.
Earned coverage is still the engine — and it always will be. What’s changed is everything that sits next to it.
The places where EdTech buyers form opinions today (superintendent newsletters, education podcasts, Substacks written by curriculum leaders, peer review threads, AI-generated answers) aren’t just “media.” They’re the broader knowledge landscape, and they’re what large language models pull from when an EdTech buyer asks AI for a recommendation.
A great earned-media program plus a strong presence across that whole map is how EdTech brands make the shortlist now.
Three things separate the EdTech brands that lead from the ones that don’t.
Consistency
Whether you’re trying to own mindshare, win share of voice, or build search leadership, consistent coverage is non-negotiable. One big hit doesn’t move buyers. Steady, layered presence does.
Validation
Competitor-free coverage in high-authority publications. Documented validation of your category leadership. Third-party signal that LLMs and skeptical buyers can both verify.
Originality
Original thought leadership and unique owned data. Our in-house research team — the same team behind the CMO Pulse — builds proprietary studies that give your brand a voice in conversations your competitors are commenting on, not leading.
Built for how EdTech buyers actually decide.
PR / AR / IR
Earned media, analyst relations, and investor communications — sequenced so coverage compounds.
Research
In-house team builds owned data that gives your brand a voice in the conversation.
Crisis Comms
When something goes sideways: a calm, prepared partner who’s been there before.
Speaking & Awards
Get your executives on the right stages and your brand into the right industry recognition lists.
Social Media
Programs that amplify earned coverage and original research instead of running parallel to them.
SEO & Search
Search visibility built for the AI era — citations, structured content, and third-party validation.
Let’s talk EdTech.
Tell us about your team and what you’re up against. We’ll come back with a no-pressure conversation about what we’d do.
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