W100 Brand Snapshot Measuring online brand strength in world- class universities Lisa Bould, Mark Sudbury, Louise Simpson November 2018 Key findings from our review of 100 top university online brands: Integrated brand Less than a fifth have Brand propositions are High quality images have campaigns are impactful consistently engaging not well differentiated a big impact but rare content “Impactful research”, Student brands are Campaigns are generally “global citizens” & Less than a third are better articulated than fundraising led and most “leaders of the future” leveraging their location research brands, but few common in Australia and are common vision as a strong brand asset do really well at either North America themes Less than a fifth of There is no strong link Few do well at promoting Little design global universities do a between rank and online partnerships, especially distinctiveness – half are great job of projecting brand power outside of the HE sector using a variant of blue Summary their international brand A fifth do a great job at Social media is largely News brands are the presenting reputational on-brand but could be success story with most claims; but almost as better integrated with doing a good or great job many were poor at this websites Recommendations for projecting a stronger online brand: Be bold Be targeted Be integrated Be real Say or do something with segmented content with social media and Use the student and unique and strong navigation other web pages academic voice 2 W100 reputation Research Method First impressions research background 8 11 4 5 Engaging content Location brand Student brand Research brand 18 27 39 51 International Reputation brand Partnerships News brand brand 60 78 87 Contents 68 Social media Online brand Campaigns Vision and values brand champions 102 110 95 116 Conclusions & Next research Appendix recommendations project 131 121 130 3 Undertaking bespoke research focused on international reputation is one of the main objectives for the W100 Network Research informs practice, explains budgetary decisions, progresses strategy, and enables reputation managers to W100 excel in their jobs The Network delivers an annual research project that pushes Reputation forward the boundaries of knowledge around reputation and helps those managing university’s image to understand it, Research and better amplify it W100 members benefit from access to current and previous research, and share the results with their colleagues to inform decision-making 4 • Universities are putting more energy and thought into expressing their brand position as they compete for research funding, top students and world-class academics • But there is a very weak understanding of brand difference or any formal impact assessment in the higher education Research sector other than via the rankings background • As websites are one of the main ways audiences interact with universities and universities articulate their ‘brand’, The World 100 Reputation Network’s 2017/18 research project looked at brands online 5 Brand = a unified presentation of the organisation to appeal to customers Differentiated brand = a brand with a unique selling point or difference that helps the organisation stand out from What we competition mean by brand Online brand = the integrated expression of the brand across the organisation’s web pages & core social media channels. Your university’s website is the most likely way stakeholders discover your brand in Higher Education 6 1. Brand propositions are not well differentiated between top-ranked universities 2. Brands are separated out between research, study and Four international, rather than offered as an integrated hypotheses expression of the whole university we tested 3. Student brands are better articulated than research brands 4. There is no correlation between a high ranked university and a university with a strong online brand impact 7 • Analysis of 100 university websites (top 50 in world in all four rankings, plus W100 members and nominated peers) • Assessed by two independent analysts against pre-agreed questions between January and June 2018 • Qualitative comments asked for the reader’s response to brand values, style etc. Method • Each university nominated five peers for benchmarking • Quantitative scores on a 1-5 scale, and an independent judge re-read websites when scores diverged s • Overall scores were calculated for each university based on logo uniqueness, design consistency, engaging content, quality images, news and social media brand, student brand, research brand, international brand, clarity and presentation of reputational claims and evidencing partnerships 8 Map of all 100 universities in the Brand Snapshot review (see appendix for full list) 9 “To what extent is the city a brand asset?” Campaigns “How does the university differentiate First its student brand?” Partnerships impressions Research Vision and brand values Brand “What are the Engaging research strengths attributes content News brand as stated on the website?” assessed Reputation Student brand brand Location Social media brand brand “What are the five main International messages that the university brand is repeating?” 10 Oxford Yale UC Berkeley • 50 Shades of Blue! Half the sample use a variant of blue as corporate colour Pennsylvania Duke Toronto First • Many sites are highly impressions consistent in design terms • Excellent images make Imperial Melbourne UBC a real difference • Traditional logos still dominate NUS Cambridge Michigan 11 Winners for First Impressions: Aarhus, Imperial, QUB, Sydney, Washington St Louis, UEA “Warm but serious and professional, clean, modern colour palette. A bit plain but like the addition of the purple. Clear, large lettering. Very consistent and effective” 12 Winners for First Impressions: Aarhus, Imperial, QUB, Sydney, Washington St Louis, UEA “Wow - a great-looking site. Lots of boxes with interesting stuff all over the place. Very clearly focused on science, engineering, medicine and business. Unusually for a UK university, no shield.” 13 Winners for First Impressions: Aarhus, Imperial, QUB, Sydney, Washington St Louis, UEA “QUB -Great images, great colours, great stories, great layout, 100% consistent across all the pages I looked at.” 14 Winners for First Impressions: Aarhus, Imperial, QUB, Sydney, Washington St Louis, UEA “Really different design - not seen another site like this before. The orange is a welcome change from navy and red. Nice website design, easy-to-navigate blocks. Large Alumni & Giving block near the top and Group of 8 Australia logo prominent. 'Start your journey to Sydney’ is striking call to action.” 15 Winners for First Impressions: Aarhus, Imperial, QUB, Sydney, Washington St Louis, UEA “Loving the homepage! Lots of inspiring and engaging content, as well as interesting facts. Dynamic running video at the top of the homepage. Can tell it’s a great website already - global engagement, the campaign and lots of other bits all visible on the homepage!” 16 Winners for First Impressions: Aarhus, Imperial, QUB, Sydney, Washington St Louis, UEA “Striking website. Unusual logo. Focused on students, not research The cross in the logo is PINK!! - the first university to use pink! Bold and dynamic, love the pink!” 17 Great = Highly engaging content 18 on every page • Pictures set the tone immediately but Engaging Great some look too homogeneous content • Photos of awards and agreements are dull! Less than a fifth have Good • Importance of white space and not too consistently engaging 45 much text content! • Scrolling features and news on home OK page for vibrancy and maturity • Two minute videos work to establish sense of place Weak OK = Some • Top 1% claims still made… 32 engaging content • Don’t overdo the menus Poor 5 18 Winners for Engaging Content: Imperial, Cornell, Washington St Louis, Sydney, QUB, Aarhus, UEA, Stanford “Not afraid to tackle the difficult topics such as animal research, women in STEM, and asking for funding. Strong and impactful research news stories (with dates!) and a selection of videos.” 19 Winners for Engaging Content: Imperial, Cornell, Washington St Louis, Sydney, QUB, Aarhus, UEA, Stanford “In the week that the Winter Olympics are taking place, Cornell is the first university to link the Olympics back to its Alumni.” 20 Winners for Engaging Content: Imperial, Cornell, Washington St Louis, Sydney, QUB, Aarhus, UEA, Stanford “I liked the mix of stories - research, academic profiles, student stories…” 21 Winners for Engaging Content: Imperial, Cornell, Washington St Louis, Sydney, QUB, Aarhus, UEA, Stanford “Interesting news stories and events presented in an exciting way.” 22 Winners for Engaging Content: Imperial, Cornell, Washington St Louis, Sydney, QUB, Aarhus, UEA, Stanford “Lots of great research news stories from a range of different fields.” 23 Winners for Engaging Content: Imperial, Cornell, Washington St Louis, Sydney, QUB, Aarhus, UEA, Stanford “Compelling research news stories and other news stories on the home page.” 24 Winners for Engaging Content: Imperial, Cornell, Washington St Louis, Sydney, QUB, Aarhus, UEA, Stanford “Everything on the homepage is written in an engaging and up-beat tone and presented in a way that makes me want to click on it!” 25 Winners for Engaging Content: Imperial, Cornell, Washington St Louis, Sydney, QUB, Aarhus, UEA, Stanford “Lots of engaging rich media - visually interesting with plenty of images used alongside text, some videos on the school pages. Dynamic image zooming