Re-branding a progressive, research-based university
Client:
Chinese University of HK, Business School
What we did:
Brand & Positioning Strategy
Internal brand training introduction workshop
Brand book
Three-year implementation plan
Competition to attract the best students, academics and researchers has increased markedly amongst all universities in HK, China and across Asia. Yet opinion amongst stakeholders, academics and students indicated that CUHK had a weak brand personality and lacked focus or any stand-out reasons for selecting it, over other, higher ranked or older and more prestigious universities.
Prestigious, established universities tend to emphasise their heritage and past accolades. This is essentially a retrospective celebration of their past. As a relatively new university, this was not practical for CUHK. We chose instead to look towards the future as our guiding mission – what CUHK was doing today and tomorrow to make a significant difference for the future. This is an optimistic, can-do perspective that goes to the purpose of tertiary education and academic research. We expressed this brand positioning as ‘Look Forward…’ In this way CUHK positioned itself as an optimistic, forward-looking university, ambitiously embracing innovation and the new, as opposed to older universities who look back at their past.
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