Brand development and digitally-driving student recruitment.
The Challenge
UBC Extended Learning (ExL) is an academic unit of UBC with the purpose of supporting learners as they continue to realize their potential beyond traditional degree programs. They approached us with the task of redeveloping their existing brand to better articulate its value proposition to a diverse and rapidly evolving group of learners.
With such a wide range of ExL learners—each with their own story, goals, and path—it was important to identify and leverage any commonalities that existed to help us unite the students.
The Solution
Through extensive consultation with various stakeholders across UBC ExL, we assisted in the creation of a series of learner personas and helped to clearly define the brand’s differentiators and market positioning opportunity. We created a Brand Blueprint, which outlines the brand values, mission, tone, and a condensed articulation of the essential brand truth:
“UBC Extended Learning offers UBC excellence beyond degree-focused learning, with relevant and future-focused content centred around you and your lifelong quest to learn and grow—personally and professionally.”
From here, we developed the brand’s visual identity and language, including the positioning statement: “You can go anywhere with knowledge behind you.”
We supported this positioning with a unique and ownable visual device—a series of overlapping yellow blocks positioned behind the head of an individual. The blocks represent the power of the knowledge and skills gained through UBC ExL courses and programs. The overlapping layers convey the unique accumulation of knowledge they’ve gathered on their journey, as well as the wide array of programs ExL offers.
The Results
The reaction from internal stakeholders has been overwhelmingly positive.
