CREATIVE CONCEPTS

“Future Index delivered a session packed with bold insights and real-world examples of youth marketing trends in 2025, energising the team and setting the tone for our planning day.”

– Stacey Anderson, Director of Marketing, UA92

Universities can often feel stuck when it comes to ideas - playing it safe, recycling the familiar, and struggling to stand out. That’s where we come in. Future Index was built on deep creative roots: our founder was a board director at a global marketing agency and is a co-founder of the award-winning Waterfall. Today, we channel that experience into bold, brilliant thinking for Higher Education. Whether it’s a campaign idea, a strategic theme or a full brand concept, we bring the creative spark. We immerse ourselves in your world, collaborate with your teams and agencies, whilst co-creating the kind of standout ideas that win attention - and awards. If you need ideas, we’ll help you find brilliant ones. Fast.

Manchester Metropolitan University

We Are International

Future Index partnered with Manchester Met’s in-house team, international students and creative agency Waterfall to create one of the sector’s first truly co-created campaigns celebrating international student life. We trained students and worked with them to shape ideas and content, resulting in a transformative user-generated campaign. The approach not only gave students a powerful voice but also delivered award-winning impact - recognised with a Heist Award.

Future Index partnered with Waterfall to create Thinking Without Borders, an award-winning content series. It began with an ideas session exploring how UEA’s research and courses connect to global water issues - from pollution and climate change to gender equality and technology. By engaging both academics and marketing staff, we developed ‘Water’, a powerful launch film that set the tone for the entire series.

University of East Anglia

Water

We ran a creative ideas session with the Swansea team to shape a fresh approach to welcoming new and returning students. The workshop was packed with inspiration, exercises and follow-up recommendations to build on the team’s ideas. The result was 20 welcoming stories spread across campus and the city - shared online, on walls and even on deck chairs.

Swansea University

Do You Speak Swansea?

We worked with the Dean and academic leads at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences to develop a masterclass approach to storytelling for digital channels and open days. Partnering with Waterfall, we turned these ideas into a suite of striking 60-second films. The campaign reached wide audiences, with over 300,000 YouTube views, showcasing the faculty’s people and stories in the most compelling ways.

University of Surrey

Fassinate