An effective brand distinguishes who you are, what you
stand for and stirs emotions.
"It's about people, not organizations," said Theodore
G. Coutilish, associate vice president, Office of Marketing
and Communications. "It's about narrowing and not being
everything to everyone. It's about your reason for being.
It's about giving a clear voice in a cluttered marketplace.
It's about framing every conversation and providing a blueprint
of where we are going."
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BUILDING THE BRAND: Billboards
like this
one along 1-94 have helped
increase projected attendance
many
times over for an upcoming Explore
Eastern
event at Eastern Michigan
University. Billboards
will be one
component of a full-scale brand
campaign
EMU will undertake this
September. |
With that purpose in mind, Coutilish is leading extensive
research efforts this winter and spring to clarify EMU's
image and planning, in September 2007, to launch its first
branding campaign.
Brand research includes reviewing current surveys, tracking
studies, committee reports, history, mission, core values,
other relevant data, and conducting quantitative and qualitative
perception studies of — and discussion groups with — high
school students and their parents, current undergraduate
and graduate students, transfer students, high school and
community college counselors, employees, board members,
alumni, donors and the general population.
Research involves asking questions such as:
- How do we gain distinction?
- What programs give us the best competitive advantage?
- EMU is WHAT for WHOM who want WHAT?
- How do we identify and magnify the collective characteristics
that define an EMU experience?
EMU brand goals are to clarify an image that students,
employees and alumni can identify with and will set EMU
apart from competing institutions and to create a, flexible,
relevant, memorable, unique and differentiating brand positioning
statement, promise and tagline. Brand objectives will be
measured by positive attitude shifts and the number of
inquiries and applications received from prospective students
and increases in private gifts to the university.
Since January, Coutilish has been meeting with a number
of campus groups and constituencies, and made presentations
on what a brand is and how it makes an institution effective.
He will continue to engage constituencies from across the
university to participate in discussions and, following
thorough research and testing of data and perceptions,
he will lead the effort to launch an internal brand campaign
in September.
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Coutilish |
"Employee buy-in is absolutely critical to the brand process
and that happens when employees are fully engaged in shaping
the brand and understanding that proper and comprehensive
research and testing are being conducted," Coutilish said. "To
be successful, the effort must be championed by our university
leadership, campus communicators and other employees from
inside out."
Shortly after, EMU will launch an external integrated,
strategic, comprehensive, high-quality and central marketing
communications campaign, helping EMU to stand out in a
marketplace where a number of colleges and universities
advertise.
The new campaign will engage EMU offices, departments,
divisions, schools and colleges, and include radio, television,
billboard, signage, publications and the Web. It also will
include a refined identity system, with a series of unified
marks and logos incorporating new brand and sub-brand taglines.
"For the brand to resonate, we will need everyone's help
to stick it everywhere, live it in everything we do and
stick with it," Coutilish said. "We will all need to live
our promise. This means delivering on, or keeping, the
promise we make and communicating it in everything we do."
For more information or to schedule a brand presentation
or focus group meeting, contact Coutilish at 487-2483 or
tcoutili@emich.edu.
