Written by Shannon O. Wells
In its 237-year history, Pitt has undertaken a branding project only once in two years: in 2019 and 2020. At that time, the coronavirus pandemic and its fallout put a brake on it, as did many other projects and initiatives.
So Rachel Richelieu, who will serve as vice chancellor for communications and marketing starting in May 2023, has picked up where her previous effort left off, focusing on telling Pitt's story without changing the colors or logo. I'm thinking of moving forward with a brand campaign. She shared her latest brand enhancement concept at the Faculty Council meeting held on March 6 in Posvaard Hall.
“Relatively speaking,[Pitt]is new to this field, but it's really important that we build on this work, especially given the impactful work that we're doing,” she said. As I said, “How we differentiate ourselves is also important.” We now have a better understanding (with) the impact of our work, our research, and our staff and students. ”
Professor Richelieu said the brand platform “is really going to help us consistently activate across the university,” and focused on strengthening Pitt's brand positioning, saying, “This is really going to help us think about ourselves. “It means how we talk about it and how we visually present it through digital storytelling and digital storytelling.” soon. That's really important. ”
This project includes building an annual integrated marketing plan.
“A lot of that will show up at the beginning of the school year,” she said. “So we're really looking at ways to meaningfully connect the dots with all the different communities that we engage with…to help people have a deeper understanding and emotional connection to the university. This is to make it happen.”
A call for proposals held in December attracted nearly 25 marketing agencies, and 160over90 global companies were selected. Richelieu said the institution's name “represents a blood pressure rise, and the work they do and help create is truly memorable and extremely fascinating.” It is intended that.''
The agency has a “healthy mix” of experience in branding higher education and non-academic institutions, she said. In addition to working with professional sports, entertainment, and fashion marketing, 160over90 is also the “Agent of Record” for American universities. In Virginia, she has worked with many individual schools for 10 years. “So there were certainly a lot of similarities … in terms of some of the opportunities of our jobs and some of the complexities of our environments,” she said.
“They have great capabilities in research and analysis, and that’s something we will be working on here soon.”
Richelieu updates brand positioning and creates differentiated messaging and storytelling framework to drive brand activity in 2019-2020 with engagement with more than 1,000 stakeholders He said he wanted to make sure he was “coordinating qualitative and quantitative insights.” And he is committed to “outstanding, bold and creative visual storytelling.”
In addition to refining the brand identity, the project will consider using the PittScript logo on items such as business card templates, “especially when there's a lot of complexity, job title, and other types of elements,” she said. Ta. “We're trying to be able to have some flexibility, but also some consistency.”
The project is currently in the “discovery” stage where 160over90 has received a “data dump” of Pitt's information and research results. It gave me a better understanding of us and much of our work. ” Representatives from government agencies visited campus in late February, interviewed student focus groups and met with Chancellor Joan Gabel.
The quantitative survey will include prospective students and their parents, alumni, Pitt colleagues, and partners.
The most high-profile series of activities will take place around Welcome Week last August, and will include high-impact video, digital and social media content, as well as “immersive on-campus activities.” included.
Two virtual focus groups are planned to solicit input and feedback from faculty. “This is really part of our effort to understand you and to hear directly from you,” she told the faculty meeting. “In your experience here, what makes you proud, what makes Pitt different? What do you think is great about the way we tell our stories? Different. What should we think about?
“This is really meant to be a way to get very diverse perspectives,” she said.
Shannon O. Wells is a reporter for the University Times.please contact him Shannon w@pitt.edu.
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