What Does Branding Mean for Students?
Administration Discusses the Branding Initiative Results
Sari Heidenreich
Issue date: 4/30/09 Section: News
During the summer of 2009, Messiah College will conclude nearly two years of engagement in a branding initiative.
Carla Gross, Director of Marketing and Public Relations, says the branding initiative is mostly about strengthening Messiah College's current ability to meet their enrollment goal. John Chopka, Vice President for Enrollment Management, says there has been an enrollment decline since the fall of 2003, when Messiah College enrollment peaked at 2,952 students.
Last fall, the college was 26 students short of their enrollment goal. Gross says strong enrollment lifts all parts of the institution and is an important revenue source for every other area of the college.
Speaking of the branding initiative, as well as other initiative the college will be taking, Chopka says, "This economy has pushed Messiah into more creative thinking."
According to an email by Gross, "The ultimate goal of the branding project is to more clearly and powerfully communicate Messiah College's distinctive and outcomes in the higher education marketplace."
She says the current economic downturn has increased competition in the student recruitment market and sent many other colleges and universities scrambling into branding initiatives.
Gross says because Messiah College began the initiative in 2007, they are now well positioned to begin leveraging the results of the branding program at exactly the right time.
In early 2008, after an interview and selection process, Messiah College hired Crane Metamarketing Crane, a small branding firm, to conducting branding research.
A brand is the position an organization holds in the minds of their stakeholders as well as the promise an organization makes and keeps to its stakeholders that distinguishes it from its competitors. Crane Metamarketing defines brand as "that position in the marketplace that only you can own."
"The roots of Messiah's current branding initiative go back to market research that Messiah conducted in the late 1990s and early 2000s, and in the work of the College's Visibility Task Force that President Phipps launched in 2006 to help Messiah strengthen its local, regional, and national visibility and reputation," writes Gross.
Carla Gross, Director of Marketing and Public Relations, says the branding initiative is mostly about strengthening Messiah College's current ability to meet their enrollment goal. John Chopka, Vice President for Enrollment Management, says there has been an enrollment decline since the fall of 2003, when Messiah College enrollment peaked at 2,952 students.
Last fall, the college was 26 students short of their enrollment goal. Gross says strong enrollment lifts all parts of the institution and is an important revenue source for every other area of the college.
Speaking of the branding initiative, as well as other initiative the college will be taking, Chopka says, "This economy has pushed Messiah into more creative thinking."
According to an email by Gross, "The ultimate goal of the branding project is to more clearly and powerfully communicate Messiah College's distinctive and outcomes in the higher education marketplace."
She says the current economic downturn has increased competition in the student recruitment market and sent many other colleges and universities scrambling into branding initiatives.
Gross says because Messiah College began the initiative in 2007, they are now well positioned to begin leveraging the results of the branding program at exactly the right time.
In early 2008, after an interview and selection process, Messiah College hired Crane Metamarketing Crane, a small branding firm, to conducting branding research.
A brand is the position an organization holds in the minds of their stakeholders as well as the promise an organization makes and keeps to its stakeholders that distinguishes it from its competitors. Crane Metamarketing defines brand as "that position in the marketplace that only you can own."
"The roots of Messiah's current branding initiative go back to market research that Messiah conducted in the late 1990s and early 2000s, and in the work of the College's Visibility Task Force that President Phipps launched in 2006 to help Messiah strengthen its local, regional, and national visibility and reputation," writes Gross.
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