Q: Brand Exercise Needed
/Hi team. We recently went through a community-wide, collaborative process to develop our new Mission and Vision. We have also just opened 4 new facilities on our campus. We are located in a highly competitive market, with changing demographics, where other schools have a clear identity (e.g. British/Progressive). We have been known as the 'American' school but have been working hard over the last few years to ensure our messaging is that we are international. Now that we have our new Mission and Vision we are thinking of undertaking a branding exercise/branding refresh. Our new guiding statements have given us key statements to identify ourselves. Do you feel that a branding exercise is required or can we use the process that we have already completed with the M/V to move forward and better articulate who we are and who we serve?
Many thanks for any guidance. From Anonymous
A: LATHAM
For me, if you’ve got this far, it’s not about logos, fonts and re-cladding the mini-buses, it’s about a narrative that can articulate that Mission/Vision and that external and internal audiences can truly rally behind. You’re looking for language/visuals to become imbedded in the culture - i.e. that people recognise and that people will actively refer to. This is a challenge of storytelling, not (necessarily) of graphic design.
I’d use Rugby School as a great example there. The Mission/Vision was in place, then it was converted into meaningful language (Whole Person, Whole Point) and then that (slightly abstract) language was converted into this - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pnOMHIPrv_M
Hope that’s helpful!
A: ENGLISH
The key consideration in answering your question is the distinction between mission/vision and brand. Mission and vision are inward facing. They guide decision making within a school ensuring that everyone has the same end goal in mind. But your brand is outward facing. It has to be relevant to the parents who are considering your school. Your brand is an expression of the relationship that stakeholders have or anticipate having with your school. Messaging built on mission/vision may not be effective brand messaging. Successful brand messaging is built on a value proposition, demonstrating how your school meets the needs and interests of parents within the landscape of competitive schools.
There are many tools that can help you arrive at effective brand messaging. One is asking yourself (collectively) a series of questions:
What does our school do best?
If our school was a person, how would we describe its personality?
How would you characterize the student and the parent experience at your school?
What is your school’s why statement? Or, conversely, what would be missing in your community or catchment area if your school didn't exist?
As you can see branding requires deep thought and lots of empathy.
Short answer: Yes, a branding exercise is required although you may be able to reframe some of the mission/vision thinking you have already done.
Good luck. Please feel free to be in contact if you need some additional help.
A: HADLEY-LEONARD
I agree with so much that has already been said, so I don't want to repeat the excellent advice, but will just offer this:
I do feel a branding exercise, to some degree, is important for you right now. The 'brand' is absolutely about mission and vision, not just graphics, uniform and stationery; it's about the culture of the school. So by doing the work you have already done, you will have much of the substance already to hand. The actual branding just needs to bring these messages to life.
However, and a real bugbear of mine, I would stress that this needs to be a school wide exercise, which runs through the substance of everyone in the school community, so do involve them all! Support staff, academic staff, alumni (often a tricky one with brand refreshes!), parents and pupils, should all have a voice in some way. Whilst this can be problematic, when handled sensitively, and with energy, it usually results in a much more collaborative result and real 'buy-in' to the new ethos/feel of the school.
A: CAIN
If you’ve done the hard work of having a great mission and vision then the next step should be developing a brand platform. Then content and creative come next. Hopefully your mission and vision process involved some internal and external market research to make sure that the market wants what you are offering. And if so, a brand platform can identify not just what you do well but HOW you do things better than your competitors. The brand messaging provides a framework for how you talk and write about the school. Think of the platform as the playbook for communicating about the school that applies to all levels from the head of school’s office to prospective student tours.
See a post on more below.
