Stonehill College
Brand Research and
Development
STEP 1: Research
Key findings
Stonehill is delivering on the following areas that prospects want:
• Variety of majors
• Strong academics
• Opportunities/achievement and success
• Consistency and reliability of the educational experience
• Supportive faculty
• Community
• Sports
• Beautiful campus
Challenges revealed:
• Boring/dull reputation
• Remote location
• Expensive
• Not diverse
• Low awareness (Stonehill is under-recognized for its distinctions)
• Prospective parents and students are more focused on outcomes –
business skills, good jobs, employment rate – than on the values of a
liberal arts education
• The internal community values attributes that prospective families can’t
identify with such as social justice, strong character and fun campus life
Recommendations:
• Raise awareness
• Highlight academic excellence in terms of critical thinking and writing as
being crucial to post-graduate success
• Aggressively and proactively address desire to see outcomes data
• Increase/promote diversity
• Promote campus life and value of being close to Boston, Providence, NYC
• Promote aspects of the College that are intangible but critical to the value
of a Stonehill education (compassion, integrity and courage)
STEP 2: Develop a brand platform based on research findings
• There are two key principles of branding: differentiation and
integration. “Differentiation” refers to the need for messages that
distinguish an institution from its competitors. “Integration” involves
communicating differentiators with consistency across departments.
• Many colleges and universities operate with a fragmented marketing
strategy; one that involves each individual department or school
implementing its own tactical-level communication with no institutionwide plan (or sometimes even unit-wide plan) guiding daily decisions.
• A coordinated plan can be implemented to help key stakeholders
understand and appreciate what Stonehill has to offer.
Step 3: Build community support
• Present and tweak messages as needed
Step 4: Develop an integrated marketing plan and strategy
• Visual brand (colors, type style, photography, video)
• Tone and personality
• Key messages
• Strategy and tactics to reach college marketing goals
Step 5: Develop creative work and launch brand
• A significant increase in visibility does not happen without significant
investment of resources to promote the brand: Stonehill website, Web
advertising and retargeting, social media campaigns, billboards, TV, radio,
newspapers, print media, public relations
• Making an impact outside of New England will require a greater
investment
• First year of launch will require greater resources, lower costs in
following years
• Internal support for a great launch creates excitement among the current
community and among alumni if done correctly
Stonehill College
Brand Message and Pillars
www.stonehill.edu/brandfeedback