Harnessing Your School's "Tremendous Potential"
In a new monthly feature, I talk to master brand strategist Michele Levy
People Talking: Q&A
This new monthly feature asks a guest to raise consciousness about a misunderstood, overlooked, underappreciated aspect of school/non-profit operations or to propose a fresh and novel approach.
In July, we are talking to Michele Levy
Michele Levy is President of Caravan Brand Partners, a team that helps mission-driven organizations build clear, compelling brands.
Julie Faulstich: Welcome to People Talking, the first Talking Out of School Q&A, Michele! You chose the topic of brand strategy. Why does brand matter for schools and other mission-driven organizations?
Michele Levy: We all interact with brands — every single day. We have brands we love, we have brands we hate, we have brands that are trying to get us to love them. All too often, people don't understand how compelling brands got that way. But brands don’t become compelling by accident, and they don't stay compelling without somebody maintaining them.
In my mind, there are four components to building a strong brand—every brand expert has their own way of talking about this, but this is what makes sense to me and my clients:
Messaging, which is where you should start
Visual identity—your logo, color palette, fonts, photography, etc.
Brand experience, which is how you and your team behave
The communications and marketing work that you do to engage stakeholders in your brand
Many times, folks start in the middle or the end of that. They go right to a name, to a tagline, to a logo, skipping over the messaging framework (and the resultant creative brief that will drive all of the rest of that work). Eventually, they get lost — because they don't have a roadmap.
It's so tempting to sit in a conference room and brainstorm names, or to sketch logos on a napkin!! But until you are clear on what your brand stands for, and have a roadmap for getting there, you can't start doing any of that other stuff.
It’s important to remember: You have a brand, regardless of whether you were intentional about building it— or not. You have a reputation. You are seen in a certain way. But if you are not strategic about that, you are not driving it. Somebody else is.
JF: I think some school people hear the word “branding” and their reaction is to wrinkle their noses and say, “so… corporate.” What is your response to that?
ML: I think people sometimes worry that the school’s brand is in some way, shape or form going to detract from the mission. Actually, a strong brand will help you advance your mission. It can be helpful to think about the big picture like this: Your mission is why you exist. Your strategic plan is where you're heading to support the mission. And your brand is the experience you create to engage your stakeholders in the journey.
I also think that for the longest time, nonprofit organizations, especially schools, didn't need to market. Many years ago, I remember reaching out to an admissions director at a well known, established school and saying, “I'd love to hear a little bit about how you market. I'm new to this field. You are really good at it. You have a great reputation. Can you share any wisdom with me?”
She sort of said, “oh, my dear, we don't market. It's just not done.”
Now if you don't market, you may not be around in the future to deliver on your mission.
JF: What advice would you have for a head or an executive director who is really just starting to get a sense of what the brand is?
ML: Step one is to assess the health of your brand. You could be blessed to come into a situation where somebody hands you a clear brand style guide and a terrific twelve to 18 month marketing communications plan. There's an ambassador program all set, there's a strong talent acquisition brand in place, and all the framework is built. At that point, all you need to do is make sure that your team has the resources that they need and your support to execute on all of that.
JF: In my opinion, it’s safe to say that the majority of schools do not have all those pieces in place, whether it’s because of resources or maybe their leadership and culture is still grappling with the role of communications in general… or a hundred other reasons.
ML: I think you've got to figure out if your organization is operationally ready to update your brand. Over the course of the past 20 years, I have only had this fail twice. And both times it was because the organization was not operationally ready to start working on the brand. By that I mean, do you have a good strategy in place for the organization? Do you know what your mission is and do you know where you're going? If you're not aligned around that, you can't start talking about engaging folks in a vision — because you don't have one.
So I think that's the first piece, and then the second piece is the same sort of listening that you would do as a new leader around operations or admissions. Ask the question of “who are we”? And see how many different answers you get.
Throw all your materials, print and digital, on the table and up on your laptop and ask, does it all look like it's coming from the same place? And does it accurately portray who we are?
Some organizations have undergone a major change or they've got a bold new strategic plan that’s a departure from their past. They've got to do a complete overhaul of the brand. But a lot of times, you're just talking about a refresh and a tightening up to adjust the focus, bring in some fresh ideas and improve consistency.
I also don't want people to think, “oh, branding, that just takes so long”. A new client just told me they did a rebranding project a few years ago, that it took forever and was really painful. That’s not the way it has to be. It should be energizing, and it should bring your team together around the tremendous potential within your organization. The process should engage your faculty, staff, board, and volunteers as ambassadors…not disengage them because it’s long and tedious.
One of the things that I've been doing lately is going in and working with organizations to help them figure out, are you ready? And if not, what will it take to get you there? I’ve been sitting around the table with folks who are the brand champions, the admissions and advancement team, and saying, do you have a problem or an opportunity? Who do we need to engage in the process of addressing that? Where are the speed bumps along the way and what's a really strong plan that is both inclusive and efficient to get you to an updated brand?
JF: As Lauren Castagnola and I wrote in our piece on the “only superheroes need apply” state of Director of Communications jobs, I think there is some confusion on the part of school leadership on how much of this work can be done internally and when you need to engage a firm. Can you make the case of why a rebranding or brand refresh needs an outside firm?
ML: There are two reasons why you should bring in a consultant to do this work. And I'm not saying this because I'm a consultant, because I will also help you figure out how to do a bunch of this on your own. One is a very pragmatic one, which is that I've been doing this for years. I have done this over and over and over again. It doesn't mean every process is similar. It doesn't mean every result is similar. In fact, I try really hard to make sure that they're not.
But I’ve seen this movie before, and I know where you're going to trip up. I know how to get in front of your board and help them understand what you're trying to do. I know how to engage your faculty and staff in this work, and to turn your families into active brand ambassadors. Very few in-house folks have that level of experience.
JF: And that's what we say to kids, too. It's about the more you do something, the better you get at it.
A consultant has just done this a lot, and they're going to be able to guide you and get you to that inclusive, efficient process. They're going to be able to help you understand the pitfalls. I also think that you should hire consultants that work in a bunch of different mission areas, because they bring a breadth of understanding and knowledge, especially these days where schools are evolving to be more than just schools. They're becoming community centers. They're doing value added programming. So I think it's helpful to have somebody who has a bigger view.
The other reason to bring in a consultant is that it is very hard to get accurate, unbiased information when it’s internal people talking to internal people. In my interviews and surveys, I promise that I will never divulge who said what. I am here to listen to them. And I am going to get brand gold in a way that an internal team never will.
I also am not wedded to the way you are or the way you're going to become. My job is not to come in and wave a magic wand and say, this is who you're going to be. My job is to come in and listen to who you want to be and how you want to engage your stakeholders—then give you the language and the rest of the tools to make that happen.
In order to do so, I need to hear the good stuff, the bad stuff, the scary stuff, the nervous stuff, the in-between stuff. Only then can I say: Here's what I heard from all of you about who you want to be,who your audience needs you to be, and who your competition is not. Based on all that, here’s the sweet spot in terms of your brand— and here's the messaging to build that brand
It’s really hard to do that on your own and it's also really hard to do if you've never done it before.
JF: Do you have any insights into the connection between “core values” and “brand”?
ML: I would translate the values of an organization into its brand behaviors. I'll give you a good example of this. There's an outdoor brand right now that is branching out and doing brand extensions into packaged foods. But if the value of an outdoor organization is that we care deeply about the environment and we want to leave this place better than we found it, I'm not sure their brand should be creating additional packaging that is going to fill up landfills.
And for a school, if a core value is “we value every perspective”, then when you do your brand work you need to value every perspective, right? You need to make sure that your discovery process listens to a range of voices — actually listens to them. Further down the line, you need to ensure that your admissions processes, the way you recruit talent, etc. are all true to that behavior.
Just like your mission and strategic plan, values are at the core of who you are and where you’re going. In order to deliver an authentic and compelling brand experience, you have to be true to those values.
JF: It makes total sense. One of the things that I believe about creating strategy is it's a way to guide your decision making process in a world full of noise. So say you're that outdoor organization and your team is excited about chasing an expanding market opportunity in packaged foods and you start developing an idea around a brand extension. But then it becomes clear this will clash with your core values. Even if there is a growing market for packaged foods, this is not a strategy that will succeed in the long term. Time to move on. All these things are interconnected and come down to how you behave day in, day out. And ultimately these efforts are going to fail if your day to day behavior does not match up to your stated brand behavior.
ML: Your brand is a promise. And if you verbalize a promise but then don't deliver on that promise in the way you behave, people will not come back. This is why schools that have something very unique to offer, whether it's a school for the arts, a progressive school, a Friends school, etc. those schools need to stay true to who they are and what they're offering. They should not try to be all things to all people - because they can't.
It is really hard to say to a lovely visiting family “we are not that sort of school, we are this sort of school.” Schools are under a lot of pressure to increase enrollment numbers. But at the end of the day, an “all things to all people” brand strategy is short sighted. You’ve got to find the people who value your promise, who will truly connect with your brand. Once you start to find those folks, they will bring you more of them.
Building a strong brand requires the courage of your convictions. As you say, strategy is about making decisions. Some of those decisions will be challenging. But they can also be transformative.
Thank you, Michele, for this enlightening and helpful interview!
Stony Creek Strategy is proud and excited to be partnering with (link) Caravan Brand Partners on our (link) Immediate Impact strategy service to transform hiring and retention practices.
Contact Julie with 1-click here to schedule a 30 min free consultation.