Working with Cognitive
Through Market Voicing we discover your institution’s DNA—the essence of your school. Together, we build your brand around the stories that are uniquely yours.
The foundation of the work of Cognitive Marketing is our Market Voicing brand development process. We developed it specifically to help our clients discover and use their most distinct, competitive, and differentiating institutional voices to meet challenges, unite community, and advance their relationships with all constituencies. The process is a highly qualitative exploration of your school’s brand through progressive conversations with members of every constituency of your community. Market Voicing is a disciplined, analytical, and yet ultimately creative process that helps form strong, emotional bonds between your school and its many communities.
Core concepts of institutional brand identity building:
Great brands are deeply rooted in the personal.
They are great because they are personally experienced and personally believed in by people who are willing to champion the brand.
Great brands are found in stories.
At the heart of our work is the sifting of countless stories of the people of an institution. We carefully read the history and engage in conversations with key members of the community. We search for the stories that have the power to reveal the distinctive nature of the school and convince others of the school’s essential truth and value. These are the stories that will combine to form a coherent whole, an anthology of brand.
Great brands are great because they’re affirming.
The brand must allow for all who are invested in the institution—students, faculty, staff, alumni, and parents—to find their own memories that affirm their satisfaction and pride.
Great brands are built on elegant, simple, and timeless ideas.
They transcend the moment. Great brands of educational institutions are a conversation between the very first students granted a degree and the ones about to enroll.