How to create a new school brand and instant awareness.
It’s not everyday you have the opportunity create a new school brand and work with a school from its very beginning. Having the right brand and marketing foundations in place are essential – no matter what stage a school is at.
In 2021 we commenced work with the Greek Orthodox community of St George in South Brisbane to help with the development of their proposed St George College, a P-6 co-educational Greek Orthodox school looking to launch in 2024.
The proposed new college will be the first co-educational Greek Orthodox Prep-6 primary school in South Brisbane and will fulfil a long-held vision for the community on building an educational institution that educates future generations in the (See below) Hellenic culture, history and traditions, as well as teaching the Modern Greek Language.
St George College will adopt the Australian Curriculum in its entirety and have as an integral part of the curriculum, the Modern Greek Language, the Greek Orthodox faith and the Hellenic culture, history, customs, traditions and beliefs.
Having worked with numerous early learning centres, primary and secondary schools in public and independent sectors, Look Education was appointed to provide a range of recommendations to the College Board. This enabled a sequential process for creating the brand and early marketing initiatives.
Key Recommendations for a new school Brand
Our first recommendation was to build a logo that was easily used as both a digital marque for uniforms and for signage. This was developed using the a new College crest and strong typography. Horizontal and Vertical versions were developed and approved.
A photoshoot was then undertaken to create a range of images for the College which could be used across marketing collateral. The photo shoot was carefully curated by our creative and content team to showcase aspects of the school’s curriculum and pedagogy. The photos will be used across digital and printed formats as well as pull up banners.
A simple WordPress website was designed, written and built by our team to provide an information platform for both the community and other stakeholders as the College embarks on its full accreditation process. Part of the website is to also house the College’s Strategic Plan document which was also written and designed by our team. To complement this social media channels were also established.
The next phase of our work involved market research and calling for early Expressions of Interest for future enrolment. The purpose of the market research was to help the Board understand key facets of the College’s positioning, likely enrolment and barriers to enrolment, so that they could address all of these areas from here on in.
This piece of work involved creating a carefully worded survey sent to the Community database and promoting this via targeted Electronic Direct Mail and social media posts. Each element of this strategy required eloquent copy and specific calls to action messaging.
The results with the survey and early expressions of interest were very encouraging with 40 expressions of interests completed online in the early stages.
The college is now working on its accreditation and funding, Master Plan and architectural footprint.
Click here to view the website.
Educational brand and marketing specialists
If you are looking to create a new sub-brand, educational extension (e.g. grow your school or establish an early learning centre) or something else, we’d be happy to help provide our strategic recommendations.
