The Challenge:
Detail how to differentiate the school – to set it apart from the other private schools in town.
As the Olympic Games fast approached, private schools targeting Expats started popping up all over town. Once seen as the premier private international school in Beijing, ISB started to see prospects choosing other schools for their children.
The Approach:
This #1 school needed to maintain its rightful place in the market.
In a 3-month strategic marketing workshop environment, we met weekly to re-assess what it is the school was trying to accomplish and determine what needed to happen to get there. We asked the tough questions…what does the school offer, who are the optimal target audiences and what do they want from them, and what types of perceptions are floating around. The final step was to develop targeted messaging and craft a routes-to-market that involved approaching segments in direct and indirect ways. Once the positioning and messaging work effort was completed, we trained the staff to be able to deliver the story on their own. We also followed the Admissions team around campus; videotaping their delivery as a training tool for improvement and for future counselors.
The Results:
Value propositions were added around all current offerings. We also created new and innovative ways to meet market needs. Because they were part of the process, staff supported the effort and became ‘champions’ of the effort. Internal roadblocks were not only minimized, but we quickly started to see staff, constituents…even students! communicating the messages we worked so hard to craft.
Lea-Ann was wonderful in “teaching” those of us in education the importance of our value proposition. Through all of our work sessions, Lea-Ann was a creative, positive and engaging force in helping ISB identify our core attributes, brand attributes and target markets in a highly competitive educational landscape in Beijing.[/success]