Life After Launch:Measuring Your Institutional Brand

*Evaluation Keyword: esbenshade

2014 CALEM, All Rights Reserved.1

Life After Launch:

Measuring Your

Institutional Brand

Wendell Esbenshade, MBADirector of Marketing and Communicationwe001@PAcollege.edu | 717-544-5253

Pennsylvania College of Heath Sciences

PRESENTATION POINTS

• Intro

• Why Rebrand? A Little About PA College

• The Rebranding Process

• Measuring Your Brand’s Effectiveness

• The PA College Marketing Dashboard

• A Few Closing Thoughts

• Q&A

INTRODUCTION

• Need systematic and intentional targeting of non-traditional markets

• To position for success, need answers to:– Who are they?

– What is it they want?

– Why do they want certain programs?

– When do they want to take classes and for how long?

INTRODUCTION

• PA College has a large

adult learner population.

– 54% adult or “non-traditional” learners (46% under age 25)

54%

46%

Adult LearnersTraditional Learners

WHY REBRAND?

• External scan revealed: low brand recognition outside Lancaster Co. and name confusion

• College’s strategic plan included rebranding initiative– Determine our brand promise

– Positioning strategy

– Establish key brand attributes

– Rename the College

A LITTLE ABOUT PA COLLEGE

• Dynamic, academically rigorous, private, accredited 4-year college

• Offers associate, baccalaureate as well as certificate programs. Master’s degrees starting Fall 2015.

• Located in Lancaster, PA. Non-residential campus with 53% of students coming from within the county we are located in.

• Exclusively health sciences-focused

• Tremendous growth in the last 10 years

• 78% of admitted students enroll

• 86% female and 14% male

• 13% minority

A LITTLE ABOUT PA COLLEGE

THE REBRANDING PROCESS

• Lengthy process (1.5+ years)

• Partnered with Stamats, Inc. (researched based approach and creative capabilities)

• Internal view vs external view

• Overlaid the two views to find commonalities and looked at where we wanted to go in the future to develop a brand promise and positioning strategy

MEASURING YOUR BRAND’S EFFECTIVENESS

• How would we know if our rebranding efforts were successful? Was the initiative worth the resources?

• Answer? Track key metrics.– Established a baseline prior to the

launch

MOVEMENT TOWARD MEASUREMENT

• Why measure?It’s the reality. The economy/technology creates savvy shoppers. Budgets are tight for schools/prospects. Competition for students is greater. Tuition is increasing, and so is student debt, while enrollment is contracting.

MEASUREMENT MATTERS!

• Senior leadership needs to see the relative value of the marketing investment.

• What is the ROI?

• Measuring the effect on outcomes is better than measuring the output.How did it effect the big picture? Did it increase brand recognition, inquiries, applications and the bottom line?

MEASUREMENT MATTERS!

BIRTH OF A DASHBOARD

• Developed a marketing dashboard to track key metricsDashboard vs Scorecard

Dashboard = operational level and visually shows day to day operations

Scorecard = leadership level displays progress over time toward a specific goal

BIRTH OF A DASHBOARD

1. Determine the results you want to see affected by your efforts.

2. Decide things your dept. is doing that would affect those results.

3. Determine what you can easily and realistically track monthly.

4. Decide how and where to compile the data.

5. Pick the way the data should be visually displayed.

BIRTH OF A DASHBOARD

The PA College Dashboard

• Illustrates the data that can be tracked

• Illustrates how that data can be displayed

A FEW CLOSING THOUGHTS

• Don’t fear measurement!

• It is a way to determine what is working and what isn’t, not something that will be used to evaluate your performance.

• Do more of what is working & shift course if it isn’t.

• Measurement demonstrates the value of your work and can gain campus allies.

QUESTIONS?

Evaluation Keyword: esbenshade