Academic Branding Research Articles

Mascot Design as Brand Identity Communication Science Study Program UMSIDA

General background: Mascots serve as effective visual identity elements for various organizations to convey character uniquely. Specific background: The Communication Science Study Program at Universitas Muhammadiyah Sidoarjo (UMSIDA) uses "Si Kombi," a character blending human and butterfly features, in colors representing the program's identity. Knowledge gap: Limited research exists on mascots' role in academic branding and public engagement. Aims: This study evaluates "Si Kombi" as a visual tool for building the program's brand and attracting interest. Results: The mascot’s design features two-dimensional elements with dominant colors, enhancing recognition and appeal among potential students. Novelty: Integrating a mascot into academic branding offers a fresh approach to promoting study programs. Implications: This study highlights how mascots can strengthen academic brands, enhance promotion, and foster emotional connections with audiences. Highlights: Brand Representation: "Si Kombi" serves as a unique visual identity for UMSIDA's Communication Science Study Program. Effective Engagement: The mascot enhances public attention, making the program more recognizable to prospective students. Innovative Strategy: Using mascots in academic branding adds a fresh approach to promotional efforts in educational institutions. Keywords: Mascot, Visual Identity, Branding, Academic Promotion

Survival analysis of the metastatic cohort of Italian Association of Medical Oncology (AIOM) GARIBALDI survey

This analysis from the GARIBALDI study was aimed to address the role of center self-declared expertise, type and commitment on the overall survival (OS) of patients with metastatic Pancreatic Ductal Adenocarcinoma (mPDAC).Treatment-naïve patients ≥18-year with pathological diagnosis of mPDAC were enrolled. OS was defined as the time from chemotherapy start to death from any cause. The impact of clinical-demographic and centers characteristics on OS was evaluated using Cox models.Between July 2017 and October 2019, 473 patients enrolled in 43 centers were eligible for this analysis. Median age was 69.3 (first-third quartile 61.2–74.5); 46.1 % females; 90.8 % ECOG PS 0–1; 67.4 % had liver metastases; median CA19.9700.5 UI/mL (first-third quartile 77.5-6629.5). For 37.1 % of patients chemotherapy started <4 weeks from diagnosis; 69.9 % of patients received nab-paclitaxel + gemcitabine; 16.9 % gemcitabine alone; 7.6 % FOLFIRINOX. The median follow-up was 51.8 months and 428 patients died. No statistically significant role of the type of institution was observed. Additionally, no statistically significant role of neither the self-declared expertise nor the accrual rate was observed.The GARIBALDI study suggests that the self-declared center expertise and the academic brand are not associated to OS in patients with mPDAC, while center commitment warrants further exploration.

Standing ‘in’ and ‘out’ from the Crowd in a Small Genre: Proximity and Positioning in Applied Linguists’ Email Signatures

Abstract Neoliberal demands in higher education (HE) amplified by the affordances of digitalisation have led to the emergence of various academic branding practices, one of which is the use of email signatures for identity work and self-promotion. Examining a corpus of 200 email signatures created by applied linguists between 2011 and 2020, this study identifies core and optional moves and how the moves orient to proximity (scholarly communities) and positioning (reputational work). The quantitative analysis of the dataset supported by semi-structured interviews with a group of academics shows that while core moves provide basic identity information, optional moves are used strategically for positioning. A comparison by career stage reveals that mid-career academics utilize more positioning than early-career and established academics. The positioning moves in the second half of the decade draw more on academic achievements, multimodality, and digital presence. The study contributes to an enhanced understanding of how a small and originally inconspicuous genre becomes a space for academic branding and evaluates this development against the increasingly competitive and precarious conditions of the neoliberal HE sector.

Ideologija i naličje moderne nauke

Science and scientific arguments are being replaced by ideology, which has become an instrument of capitalist greed, profit maximization and technology materialization. A culture is being created that is largely opposed to scientific reasoning and spirituality. Many scientists are getting rich in a manner criticized by science, casting doubt on the entirety of science, especially social sciences. Knowledge is not a priority, but rather the maximization of profits for private investors, and the protection of the priorities of the power elite. Instead of genuine engagement, academic branding and mind control are being practised. This also involves the degradation of academic work. The publishing and scientific industries work against the scientific community. Scientific results depend on the motives of the sponsors. The industrial form of science works against scientific progress. The coupling with capitalism is the modern face of science, presented in the form of ideology, the ruthless onslaught of capital, by the method of enslaving people. The essential question is how we can protect the freedom and creativity of science. The aim of this paper is to highlight the problem and relevance of these issues, connecting science and propaganda through the instrumentalization of pseudoscience, which negates its subject of research, by legitimizing expert knowledge. The analysis relies on classical texts of great minds and the application of indicative sociology.

Lecturer’s Personal Branding in the Digital Era: Building Good Reputation and Positive Image through Social Media

This research describes the lecturer’s branding in the digital era to build a good reputation and positive image through social media. This research uses library research. The analysis shows that the digital era and technological developments have provided numerous benefits, including the ability to build and promote personal branding on various social media platforms. Social media platforms and personal websites/blogs can be used to create a personal brand and establish an online identity. Academic and publication portals such as Google Scholar, Sinta, ResearchGate, Orcid.org, and others can be utilized to promote the lecturer’s scientific works and establish a professional image and social ties within the community. Therefore, personal branding is essential for lecturers to establish a strong self-image and a directed career, allow for a wider public reach, and focus on goals and relationships with the Tri Dharma of Higher Education. Besides, the other benefits of a lecturer’s branding include building confidence, increasing credibility, building academic branding for an institution, becoming the face of the world of national higher education, expanding the network and relationships, developing capabilities and skills, having academic achievements, being active on social media, becoming a friendly and open lecturer, develop capabilities and skills, and increasing income. Critical factors for personal branding include creating knowledge, building trust, creating a reputation, and influencing perception. By focusing on these aspects, lecturers can create a good reputation and positive image to contribute to their career development.

Creating Value for Brand Practice by Design Research—New Brand Sprint as an Illustrative Example

As discussed under the keyword of Academic-Practitioner-Gap, the current academic brand research offers low value for practitioners. Design Research helps to develop practice-relevant questions and solution tools to fill this gap. This study proposes four criteria for conducting and evaluating design research projects in order to disseminate the approach in academic brand research: (a) Real user needs, (b) Trial-and-error process, (c) Artifact and (d) Pragmatic validity. The application of these criteria will be illustrated using the case New Brand Sprint, a 32-month research project in the context of brand positioning conducted along the steps inspiration, ideation/iteration and implementation, which are structuring a design research project. The New Brand Sprint enables start-ups and other companies to develop a good brand positioning within three hours using the New Brand Sprint Canvas and working in a group with strict timeboxing and clear roles. With the proposed criteria and the presented case study New Brand Sprint, the study shows that design research can contribute to closing the gap between theory and practice due to its user-centeredness and pragmatic validity.

Generating students’ loyalty towards the sustainable university during the later COVID-19 pandemic

PurposeThe COVID-19 pandemic has brought tremendous changes in society. Universities were among the few organisations with some previous knowledge of online education, being able to rapidly adapt by transferring already known best practices to the new context. As teaching moved to online, students encountered less sustainable implementation by their universities. This allowed the development of previously planned sustainable strategies so that when face-to-face teaching resumed, universities could be even more sustainable. This paper aims to explore loyalty to the sustainable university during the later COVID-19 pandemic based on the university’s efforts to manage a green campus.Design/methodology/approachTo investigate loyalty towards the sustainable university during the later COVID-19 pandemic, a conceptual model is proposed. This research is grounded in an empirical investigation using a quantitative online survey implemented with online interviews, the relations between all latent constructs being analysed with SmartPLS.FindingsThe results show that university sustainability reflects student loyalty, outlining the image developed under the influence of green campus management. The results show that universities must intensify their efforts to support the sustainable agenda and create a sustainable academic brand, inducing student loyalty. The findings may attract the attention of other universities wishing to gain knowledge about the factors that students consider important in generating their loyalty.Research limitations/implicationsAs this research was carried out in the later COVID-19 pandemic context from 2021, the students already had experience of online teaching, so their assessment of the sustainability strategies implemented could be quite different from their perceptions in the first months of the pandemic. This research provides a comprehensive insight into the overall strategy that a sustainable university might apply in a crisis context.Social implicationsResearch has shown that green campus management has a positive impact on the sustainability of a university’s image, on how students perceive the university at which they study and on the university’s efforts to ensure efficient campus management. These factors contribute to the development of a strong and sustainable image of the university within the community.Originality/valueThe originality of this paper lies in the research questions designed to conceptualise and operationalise the generation of students' loyalty towards their university by encouraging and implementing sustainable strategies on campus. This paper highlights a structural model that combines strategic practices to determine students' loyalty towards a sustainable university during the COVID-19 pandemic.

&lt;p&gt;Factors Affecting University Graduates’ Employability in Egypt Using Egyptian University Students as a Case Study&lt;/p&gt;

Employability refers to the process of gaining initial employment, maintaining employment, and successfully obtaining new employment if required. In simple terms, employability is about being capable of obtaining and keeping fulfilling work. Employability is having a set of skills, including knowledge, understanding, and personal attributes that make a person more likely to choose and secure occupations in which they can be satisfied and successful. Employability depends on knowledge (what you know), skills (what you do with what you know), and attitudes (how you approach things). In higher education, the employment of university graduates is influenced by many factors including institutional ranking, image, branding, and program structure. Therefore, university reputation in specific programs is important and affects the employability of graduates directly.&#x0D; In a recent paper by the corresponding author, we argued that university branding is critical for developing a favorable image and impacts one’s identity formation and promotion substantially, thus differentiating and placing one in a highly competitive context. In this paper, we will investigate the factors that influence employability among university graduates and determine which ones can affect the overall graduate employability of university graduates in Egypt. These factors include academic branding, academic performance, technical skills, communication skills, personality, leadership and motivational skills, and teamwork and problem-solving skills, taken as independent variables, while overall graduate employability was considered the dependent variable. In addition, we consider the impact of the university’s reputation on graduate employability.&#x0D; Survey methods were used on 500 graduates and undergraduates (fourth level) from different Egyptian universities who have not yet performed employability behavior, chosen at random, by using exploratory factor analysis to validate the items under those independent variables and structural equation modeling with AMOS to test the hypothesized relationship between the independent variables and the dependent variable. The questionnaire had 20 questions, including demographic inquiries and questions about the abovementioned topics. The findings of this study can help scholars further investigate the employability aspects and guide fresh graduates in acquiring the required employability skills while assisting companies in recruiting suitable people with the required skills and performance.

“Ring up for an appointment”: Empirical & oral evidence of commercial & other freedoms in the heyday of the City

Informed by economic concepts of product competition, this paper uses publicly available and accurate business information on establishment names and addresses obtained from the Yellow Pages of the contemporary Hong Kong telephone book and census socio-economic data backed by oral testimonies, to dispel the myth that the “Kowloon Walled City” was an incarcerated ghetto. The use of this imagery in the title for this City as a built up, politically sensitive zone levelled to the ground to make way for a public Chinese garden shortly before Hong Kong was returned to China, is treated as a form of ‘product differentiation’ in the academic research marketplace. As a contribution to planning theory, the paper uses the City as a show case of how academic branding, through descriptors, creates images of places and offers a countervailing image. Technically, it demonstrates the immense archival value of telephone directories and business chronicles apart from census data as sources of socially significant data for urban studies and informed re-interpretation of subjective imageries of an urban place.

University trademarks: strategies of top Chinese universities

Fierce, ever-increasing competition has prompted universities to pay more attention to their academic brand. Since the 1980s, top Chinese universities have begun to register trademarks and manage academic brands. After more than 20 years of hard work, what have they achieved? This paper, which conducts research based on big data on the trademarks and litigation of the 42 first-class universities, is the first systematic analysis of the trademark practices and strategies of Chinese universities. Our data show the following dimensions of top Chinese universities: the timing of the first trademark application, core trademark, non-core trademarks, trademark elements, distribution of trademarks in the Nice Classification, number of trademarks, legal status, and trademark litigation. Additionally, several typical universities, offering both positive and negative examples, were studied. Through the above analysis, we found that the application has some blind spots, there is a lack of initiative in trademark litigation, and the trademark management systems in universities are not considered relevant. To solve these problems, a range of suggestions from macro to micro is offered to help universities formulate a systematic and reasonable trademark protection strategy, strengthen the legal protection of their trademark rights, and improve their internal trademark management system.

On academic branding: A review of the factors influencing research agenda choice and prioritization in management

AbstractThis paper aims to investigate the process of setting a prioritized research agenda that tackles the relevance gap in the management field as a method of academic branding for scholars. This is done by assessing the institutional and individual factors that affect research agenda prioritization for the management scholar. A conceptual approach, that is the outcome of theory analysis and the investigation of previous literature, is adopted. This results in a conceptual framework that tackles the relationship between the factors on one side and decision‐making styles on the other. The study has implications for scholars to keep in perspective a conceptualization of the factors that could influence their research agenda setting process. This study has two contributions. First, the delivery of a conceptual framework that is relevant to management scholars to help prioritize research agenda that contributes to academic branding, and second is the linking of decision‐making styles to these factors.

Unsanctioned user-generated content: student perceptions of academic brand parody

PurposeWhile universities and colleges engage in marketing their brands through official communications, there also exists the unique case of social media accounts created by and for university students, which have the sole purpose of disseminating humorous parody content about the university. These accounts and their content are neither managed nor sanctioned by the university. While user-generated satire has been studied in the areas of politics and popular culture, it has not often been considered within the realm of universities and their student stakeholders.Design/methodology/approachA total of 200 undergraduates at a large public university in the southeastern United States were surveyed regarding their engagement with and thoughts about parody accounts associated with their school.FindingsAll students surveyed were aware of these parody accounts associated with their university; however, results suggest that enjoyment of and engagement with these accounts varies. Those students engaged with university parody accounts experience heightened identification with, but reduced concern over this satirical (and often unprofessional) community, which could be harmful to their university's image.Practical implicationsAlthough educational institutions aim to convey an outward-facing message of academic excellence and professionalism, their student population may create, engage with and disseminate alternative messaging that must be considered.Originality/valueWhile this unique form of online brand engagement is potentially harmful to the university image due to its humorous nature, it also can be seen as a form of brand community, lending to feelings of group identification for students. Brand parody within social media remains a largely ignored topic within higher education marketing.

Academic Branding and Positioning through University’s Website Profile

Personal branding is becoming an essential concept for academic staff. They often use their owned media such as social media, blogpost and website to engage with the audience and disseminate their works. This study, however, focuses on the staff profile on the University’s website. The web page is a media earned by the staff, by virtue of their employment but owned by the University. The University controls the content of these webpages but allows the academic staff to present themselves based on the stipulated. This study analyzed academic staff profiles across 136 UK Universities. Twenty-eight key sections were identified and further group into five themes of Personal Information, Educational Information, Research Information, Industry Information and Engagement Information. There were instances of incomplete and outdated profile and profile with no photographs. The study contributes to studies on academic branding and higher education marketing. The study highlights the responsibilities of the University to provide the platform and encourage staff to make use of the opportunity to develop and maintain their brand. It offers practical implications for University Managers, Information and Communications Technology, Marketing Communications and Academic Staff on how to develop and manage staff profile.

Declining the Big East: A Case Study of the College of the Holy Cross

Abstract The case study examines Holy Cross’ decision not to join the Big East Conference in 1979. Specifically, the case analyzes the commitment to a marketing strategy to de-emphasize athletics at a time when many institutions were using the growth of television to help market their university brand. The study also highlights the impact the decision has had on the institution and the athletic department since 1979. Data were gathered by interviewing two former administrators with over 50 years of experience at Holy Cross, and reviewing archival data and documents including administrators’ correspondence and letters, newspaper articles, magazines and websites related to Holy Cross athletics. Themes are presented in a chronological format to show the sequence of each theme. Results indicated that although the Big East presented many opportunities, administrators valued the academic brand of the institution and refused to sacrifice that brand in the pursuit of big-time athletics.

Knowing Your Personal Brand: What Academics Can Learn From Marketing 101.

Academic departments are increasingly borrowing from the business world as they encourage faculty members to consider their personal mission, vision, and values statements in crafting their plans for engagement and advancement. Business organizations have long known that although doing the work necessary to refine these internal guideposts is important, failing to understand what consumers actually perceive about their product is detrimental. In the business world, perception is reality, and understanding the external shorthand of what consumers perceive-that is, the brand-is essential. Academic clinicians have a brand whether they take ownership of it or not. A faculty member's brand is both what their work (academic products) and how they do their work say about them to those who encounter it. In this Perspective, the authors explore the brand framework informed by marketing literature, and they outline a four-step process for faculty members to identify their own personal brands. The authors share how knowing one's academic brand can (1) help faculty members approach projects and other responsibilities through the lens of building or detracting from that brand, (2) provide a framework for determining how faculty members might best work within their institutions, and (3) help faculty members better understand and advocate their own engagement and advancement. The authors also share a paradigm for finding one's brand sweet spot at the intersection of passion, skill, and institutional need, and they propose how working outside of this sweet spot is a setup for failure.

A Qualitative Investigation of Academic and Athletic Brand Representations: Applying Lovemarks Theory to Cultural Symbol

Abstract The current study applied Robert’s lovemarks theory of branding to interpret a photo-elicitation approach of two academic/athletic brand representations. Three major themes emerged from the participants (N = 88) in the study of the Thinkman logo image: a) Intellectual Enhancement; b) Athlete; and c) Hard Work. By eliciting responses from the participants (N = 75) regarding the term Scholar-Baller , the following three themes emerged: a) Amazing Scholar &amp; Exceptional Athlete; b) Top Student; and c) Student-Athlete. The current findings indicate many of the participants responded favorably to the photo-elicitation of two academic/athletic terms and logos. The participants also critiqued both representations in the context of the broader and specific discourses about the student-athlete experience in American higher education. Implications and recommendations for scholars and practitioners are suggested.

The scientific event – a visibility factor for the university brand

Abstract Events are considered to be the most personalised form of marketing, as they generate direct contact with customers and partners. Academic events aim at promoting socio-economic values by facilitating collaborative partnerships with the involvement of academics, researchers, graduates, students and representatives of the economic environment. They also aim to set up participatory networks between socio-economic actors, academic centers and research institutes, as well as between different communities at national and international level in different fields of activity. The experience offered to the participants creates a close relationship with the academic brand, which gains a human face, which positively influences the way it is perceived by the public. Through academic events, it is favored to combine ideas, generate new concepts and phenomena that are useful to society’s progress. Moreover, by debating and analysing current trends on how both the economy and the university are affected, new theoretical and practical opportunities can be identified. The main purpose of experiential marketing in academic events is to create memorable and long-lasting ties between the participants and the academic environment, as well as to generate real opportunities for socialisation and interpersonal interactions. The article will treat the results of a qualitative exploratory marketing research. It aims at clarifying and understanding the paradigm of the scientific event as a factor of university visibility. In this sense, we aimed to identify the relationship of interdependence between the scientific event and the brand of an university.

Monkey Wrench?: Virtues of a Weak Posthumanism

Monkey Wrench?:Virtues of a Weak Posthumanism Mads Rosendahl Thomsen (bio) Monkey Trouble: The Scandal of Posthumanism by Christopher Peterson. Fordham University Press, 2018. 160 pp. Hardcover: $95.00, Paperback: $28.00. Posthumanism comes in many varieties. Some theories are focused on the importance of technology that could lead to transhumans, others engage in the decentering of the subject and the problematic privileged position of the human race, both epistemologically and morally. In addition, there are numerous ways by which human-animal-matter divisions are being criticized. It is often telling if it is possible to spot a hero in a theory: Is it other large animals that display emotions, or all of Earth's fauna? Should flora be included, or is matter as such the real new hero? Obviously, the human is not a hero, but not always a villain either. In Monkey Trouble, a lively and passionate book, Christopher Peterson asks how this can be, and criticizes work in the field of posthumanism for having thrown out a lot with the bath water of anthropocentrism. Some of the motives behind radical discourses may be the urge to create a strong position in academia, Peterson argues in the opening, and suggests that an element of academic branding is taking place (21). On the other hand, we certainly live in a time where both the future of the Earth's ecosystem and the question of human identity, and its possible interventions into its own nature, makes it difficult to blame anyone who wants to tackle these issues for being overly [End Page 271] grandiose. Peterson's suggestion that a "'weak' posthumanism" is worth pursuing, implicitly following Gianni Vattimo's call for a "weak thought," is a sympathetic proposal, not least in the light of Peterson's critique of the tendency to go for the paradigmatic shifts. Peterson deftly shows how one of the foremost scholars of the field, Cary Wolfe, evades the temptation of building a strong thinking but keeps the aporia open. Monkey Trouble's four chapters take up questions of language and ontology. Chapter 1 argues that the advanced stage of human language does make a difference and separates humanity from other species without giving it a higher moral status, and Chapter 2 continues in this track but shifts the perspective to the silence of the others. Object Oriented Ontology is criticized in Chapter 3 for going all in on a flat ontology that preaches immanence, which Peterson is not the only one to be skeptical about, also getting in a few zingers: "Size apparently doesn't matter for OOO (unlike its XXX counterpart)" (71). However, Monkey Trouble is a short book, and Peterson has wanted to bring too much into it. Art, literature, and film are drawn on frequently but mostly in a way that does not go beyond the thematic level. J. M. Coetzee's novel Foe, the poetry of Walt Whitman, and the films Gravity and Melancholia are all quite relevant to explore the discourses of posthumanism, but they neither provide the basis for a new and convincing argument nor are they analyzed in a way that does justice to the works themselves. The human-animal divide seen through Coetzee, immanence seen through Lars von Trier's and Alfonso Cuarón's films, and the totality of everything seen through Whitman all makes sense, but also seems to evade a more thorough discussion as well as a clearer engagement with the political dimension of posthumanism. Nonetheless, there is of course an elegant rhetorical point in juxtaposing the arguments of works of fiction and their distinctive viewpoints with the positions taken in posthumanist theory, not least because the artistic visions are not based on undisturbed abstractions but engage with fully-fleshed worlds. Peterson also seeks to clear up arguments concerning posthumanism through recurrent references to the work of Jacques Derrida. He shows how Derrida's work today remains relevant for understanding discourses of post-humanism, and Derrida's regular but scattered presence in the book shows the value of pushing conventional wisdom out of its comfort zone. There are number of important issues that are touched upon but are not developed more thoroughly. Race, which Peterson...

A question of unity: Institutions should weigh the risks and opportunities of unifying their athletic and academic brands

The lines between academic brands and athletic brands can be blurry. Athletic brands are enduring and ascendant, even now, as institutions embrace sophisticated narratives that amplify their academic brand. Ultimately, the value of a unified academic and athletic brand is informed by an institution’s culture, as well as its unique challenges, opportunities and aspirations. This paper presents the benefits, risks and broader considerations inherent in merging academic and athletic identities into a single unified brand.

Branding an academic superbrand

In spring, 2013, Tel Aviv University — an Israeli higher education superbrand that had never been branded — embarked on a branding process in pursuit of its defining narrative. This decision was taken despite the leadership’s awareness of the many challenges in academic branding, with some processes resulting in success and others in ringing failure. What prompted a de facto superbrand to seek formal branding? How did a thorough strategic process manage to make dry academic research relevant and accessible to children, students, parents and donors alike? What did it take to implement the branding in a complex organization, as well as deal with internal objections and serious crises along the way? The story of Tel Aviv University’s branding is applicable to any institution that is considering branding or rebranding, especially academic ones and NGOs. This paper takes you step by step on a journey that begins with identifying problems and needs, dives deep into a fascinating strategic process; and continues through the systematic implementation of the brand.