by Joe Sullivan
UT's fixation on brand marketing runs afoul of my sense of what a university should be all about. Hence, my skepticism when UT last fall retained a consulting firm, the Educational Marketing Group, to "assist in developing a unique and compelling market position, brand identity and integrated marketing plan" for the university.
At the same time, I respect President John Shumaker's sense of UT's need to build a stronger, clearer identity. His goals for attracting more research grants, a more selective student body, and a much enlarged endowment all depend on it to some degree.
Arguably, the difference between a brand and an identity is largely a matter of semantics. But EMG's recently released report and recommendations seem too Proctor and Gamble-ish to me. A key recommendation is the "development of an annual integrated marketing plan under the direction of the Vice President for Public and Government Relations" which "should be used as the framework for ongoing strategic planning on an institutional basis." That's the tail wagging the dog when it comes to setting a university's priorities and strategies for carrying them out.
The EMG report is better at identifying problems (though many of them are obvious) than it is at offering solutions. Only a few of those set forth in the 60-page document can be highlighted within the confines of this column, as follows:
 Confusion abounds as to what constitutes the University of Tennessee across the five campuses and several institutes that comprise the UT system. "In the absence of a System brand strategy," the report states, "each of the campuses, as well as many of the units within each campus, unilaterally launched their own identities...This has encouraged a cacophony of messages being sent to external audiences, all under the name of the 'University of Tennessee.'" The confusion has been compounded, in EMG's view, by their common use of the UT logo and even the very acronym UT.
But EMG's recommendation to get rid of the logo and suppress use of the acronym seems about as likely to succeed as Coca Cola's ill-fated attempt to drop the Coca Cola brand in favor of "New Coke." And EMG doesn't even have a suggestion as to what the university's "New Coke" should be beyond a jargon-laden expression of the need to "develop a clear concise System brand architecture that outlines how the System defines its core brand, differentiated brands, brand extensions, and independent brands."
One point on which EMG is clear is that the core brand should be an integration, at least for marketing purposes, of UT's flagship Knoxville campus and its Health Sciences Center in Memphis. Indeed, the very name "The University of Tennessee" would be reserved for "the core brand" exclusively, leaving UT's campuses in Chattanooga and Martin to come up with new nomenclatures on their own. The system as such would also be subordinated in the interest of enabling Knoxville and Memphis to project an integrated brand identity. Shumaker has already moved in that direction as part of his effort to draw upon their combined strengths in establishing UT as a major public research university worthy of more federal grants. But that movement is poorly understood outside the confines of Andy Holt Tower.
Another big problem, as the EMG report well states, is that, "A prolonged period of uncertainty and cuts in state funding have encouraged many stakeholders to reinforce messages that the University's academic quality has suffered serious damage from a lack of funding. These messages have been so effective...that they have become, in essence, a negative brand identity, damaging the institution's public image."
As part of the solution, EMG recommends strengthening the university's marketing efforts for getting a positive message out. UT's present level of investment in marketing "puts the university at the very low end of the range for similar institutions," and "EMG recommends incrementally increasing the overall investment in marketing and communications to support this broader marketing initiative."
Yet this recommendation comes at a time when UT's budget bind has gotten tighter than ever. So much so that UT Vice President for Public and Government Affairs Tom Ballard acknowledges that most of the EMG recommendations aren't even getting attention at this point. "We are totally focused on budget cuts and how to do them with minimal impact on institutional priorities," he says.
Ballard, who spends much of his time as UT's lobbyist in Nashville, is also quick to acknowledge that he doesn't have any expertise for the role of integrated brand marketing guru that EMG would thrust upon him. One of EMG's recommendations that is getting attention, though, is creating and filling the position of assistant vice president for marketing and communications to complement him. "The president has said we must invest in some of our strategic areas, and this position is one of those areas that it's critical we invest in," Ballard says.
EMG also concludes that, "The University of Tennessee (core brand) has not established its own unique and compelling brand identity or consistent set of key messages based on academic quality. Internal stakeholders are unclear about the most important academic strengths of the University."
The recommended solution: "The senior leadership of the System and the Knoxville and Memphis campuses should create a positioning statement and brand promise, based on broad stakeholder input, which define a singular and compelling leadership market position competitive with the top public research universities in the U.S....The singular brand identity should be supported by three to five key messages that powerfully communicate the international prominence, prestige, vitality and relevance of the University of Tennessee."
Lots of luck to all involved in such an exercise at this time.
April 10, 2003 * Vol. 13, No. 15
© 2003 Metro Pulse
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