Each week on “Around Town,” our host talks to members of the First Coast community who are making an impact in their part of town. Today our host, Sarah Olson, spoke with Joseph Lapin.
Joseph Lapin
Founder of Campbell Learn
Website Address: BestHopeTherapy.com
Short company description:
Joseph Lapin is the founder of Campbell Learn, a higher education marketing agency based in Jacksonville. With over a decade of experience helping top universities like Harvard Kennedy School and Tulane University grow enrollments, Joseph blends strategic marketing with storytelling rooted in the Hero’s Journey. Through his work, he’s helping institutions reimagine how they connect with students—and helping students see themselves as the hero of their educational path.
What’s the biggest challenge people in your side of town face?
The biggest challenge we see—whether it’s in Jacksonville or across the country—is that too many institutions are struggling to tell a compelling story. They have great programs, passionate faculty, and life-changing outcomes, but they’re stuck using outdated marketing that doesn’t connect with today’s students. At Campbell Learn, we believe every student is the hero of their own journey—and our job is to help institutions become the guide. The challenge is cutting through the noise with clarity, authenticity, and strategy—and that’s exactly what we’re here to solve.
What’s one piece of advice you’d give someone new to side of town?
Don’t wait for permission to build something meaningful. Whether you’re launching a business, a program, or a creative project—start with a clear story about who you are, who you serve, and why it matters. The moment you start telling that story with clarity and confidence, people will start showing up.
What’s one thing people should know about why side of town is a great place to live or invest?
This side of town—like a lot of overlooked places—is full of untapped stories and smart, driven people who are building real things. It’s not flashy, but it’s fertile. There’s room to grow here—whether you’re launching a business, starting a family, or investing in education. If you believe in creating value through purpose and connection, this is a great place to build.
Transcript:
Sarah:
Welcome back to another episode of Around Town. I am your host, Sarah Olson, and today joining me from Amelia Island is Joe Lapin with Campbell Learn. How are you?
Joe:
I’m doing great. Yeah. Thanks so much. Beautiful day here. So I’m ready to go, locked and loaded.
Sarah:
Yes. You’re getting ready for the concourse up there, too. Have you ever been to the concourse in Amelia?
Joe:
Oh, I love the concourse. My kids love it, but there’s going to be a lot of traffic. They got streets blocked off, and I can’t wait. I can’t wait to see cars and meet the people and show my, like, six year old the cars. He’s so excited about seeing a Ferrari, and it’s really fun.
Sarah:
Oh, cool. But you’re here to talk about your business and we want to learn more about Campbell Learn, higher education storyteller. Tell us a little bit about yourself.
Joe:
Yeah, I think I’m happy to do that. And what I always tell people when they ask that question, like tell me about you, I think what makes me really unique is that I blend storytelling with performance marketing.
And what I mean by that is I have an MFA in creative writing. I was a journalist in Los Angeles. I was writing for the L.A. Weekly, L.A. Times, and various other publications. But at that time journalism was really being hit financially, and it was really difficult to make that work.
But I always wanted to be a storyteller. I publish stories and essays and poetry, and my goal in life is to write novels and memoirs and all of that.
But I knew I needed to make a living. And just naturally I kind of fell into marketing and fell in love with marketing, in fact. I really saw that my storytelling capabilities could apply directly to marketing.
Luckily I fell into higher education where stories of students, stories of programs, stories of universities are so unique.
But when you think about the digital world and where that has gone, digital media, what actually is rewarded in performance marketing is really compelling creative content. So I was naturally able to blend those worlds professionally and create a unique element out in the market.
We’re called Campbell Learn because I’m a huge fan of Joseph Campbell.
One of the most important things in my life was in graduate school when my professor handed me a copy of a book by Chris Vogler, which is basically applying Joseph Campbell’s philosophy to movies. It’s behind Star Wars and many other stories.
But it’s that DNA of story that exists almost in our essence as humans, and that understanding is, to me, the key of great marketing, great business, and great relationships.
Sarah:
Do you have a favorite story that you’ve told, or a favorite ad campaign that you created, or a moment that was like, yeah, this just clicks and makes sense?
Joe:
Yeah, I have a lot. I would say the one that I always bring up is when we worked for American University School of Education.
I’ll never forget when things completely changed for me. We had a student in the program, an education policy masters program. Someone who’s thinking bigger about school systems and trying to change policy.
Well, we found out that she decided to go to the school because of something that happened the day she found out she couldn’t have children. Obviously that’s a really hard day for her.
But when she found out she couldn’t have children, she and her husband decided that they were going to take in a foster child and eventually adopt this child.
As they were raising this child, they saw there were significant learning challenges. The specifics aren’t as important to the story, but it was enough that she really wanted to learn about interventions and education to better support their child.
They were so into it that she eventually became a special education teacher. She’s in the classroom and struggling because there are so many issues for these students that she feels she can’t solve.
That’s when she saw one of our ads. The concept was basically, raise your hand if you want to transform education for everyone.
It’s set in D.C., so you’re playing on the image of the American promise and equality. You literally have people raising their hands in front of the Capitol and all these buildings.
What I think is powerful about that example is that the story is not your marketing. If you do marketing right, the story is that person.
They’re developing that story and you’re almost building an architecture for myth.
When you think about the impact you can have on the world, that’s where storytelling and digital marketing become transcendent and transformational.
And that’s important for higher education. I work with Macomber Brewing as well, and it’s important even for brewing. And shout out to Macomber Brewing, who is absolutely awesome and kicking. Great place.
Sarah:
We’ve been there several times.
Joe:
Oh yeah. Great to hear that.
Sarah:
So how do people find you? How do companies find you? Are you out there marketing yourself a lot, or is it more word of mouth now?
Joe:
Yeah, that’s a great question. I started the business about a year ago.
Part of the story is that I became a partner in a small business with my brother in law and a good friend, Robert Lee. That company grew so much that we actually sold it and were acquired by a great company called Archer Education.
So I was able to get a lot of great experience at Archer Education and a company called Bisk.
But ultimately I was like, I just want to go back to building my own company. And in the first year it’s exceeded my expectations.
We’re getting requests and we have to figure out what projects we want to take on.
Right now I’m not really out there selling as much as business coming through LinkedIn and referrals.
If you want to find me you can go to CampbellLearn.com or find me on LinkedIn.
Sarah:
That’s awesome. That’s a tribute to being a good marketer, I guess, as people are finding you.
Joe:
I appreciate it. And I want to grow.
Sarah:
So does AI have any influence on you right now?
Joe:
Oh my God, yes. I can’t begin to tell you how important AI is for me.
We work with some businesses that promote AI programs, and for me personally AI has transformed everything I do.
It has improved my workflows and work product. I don’t need as many contractors. I don’t need to hire.
It’s funny, I used to train a lot of folks on storytelling. Now I train bots.
I still think it’s important to have contractors to help scale, but those contractors are also using the bots and it produces great work.
I have custom GPTs that teach me how to cook better. Every week I have a custom bot building me a lifting plan. I have a writing partner.
I ask questions all the time that help me with life.
Honestly, Sarah, I think I’m just scratching the surface of what’s possible. I don’t remember how it used to be.
Sarah:
I wrote this huge workbook for a class that I’m teaching. It’s my ideas and what I want the outcome to be, but it didn’t take me a year to do it.
Joe:
Exactly. And I was thinking about this this morning. Some people are still like, oh, but I wrote it using an em dash.
Sarah:
I don’t even know what an em dash is.
Joe:
An em dash is when you’re writing and you use a longer hyphen that creates a deeper pause and rhythm in writing.
ChatGPT knows this. It wants to write really well with voice, so it uses it.
Now everyone says if you use an em dash you’re using AI. I love em dashes.
Sarah:
Somebody still has to put the thought into AI in order for the outcome to come. It doesn’t tell us what to do. We tell it what to do.
Joe:
Absolutely. Discovery is a big part of storytelling and marketing.
So I get in there with universities and businesses, and I do a lot of interviews and feed that into my custom bot.
I think the secret to getting from something sloppy to something good is that you have to train it.
And then I hand it off to the clients. Here’s what I built for you. It’s trained on your voice, and now you can scale on your own.
Sarah:
Oh my gosh. We could probably talk about AI for another three hours, but our episode has come to an end.
Joe, I have to thank you so much for being on the show. This has been great.
CampbellLearn.com is where people can find you and hire you.
And thank you all for watching another episode of Around Town. This segment will be on PropertySolutionsTV.com.
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