Harvard Kennedy School

Challenge:

Committed to advancing the public interest through education, Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government set out to redesign their Web site but quickly realized they would also need help refreshing their brand message and image.

BBMG won the competitive pitch in collaboration with Digital Pulp, a New York-based interactive agency.

Insight:

It’s not every day you own the rights to a line like “Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country,” spoken by John F. Kennedy during his 1961 inaugural address.

After testing early concepts with focus groups that included Kennedy School faculty, staff, students and alumni, we developed a brand strategy to harness once again the emotional power of President Kennedy’s call to service: Ask what you can do. This insight became the unifying concept for the school’s new strategic communications efforts, including the redesign of its Web site.

Solution:

In addition to making “Ask what you can do” the School’s new tagline, we also created a new verbal identifier for the school, recommending that it position itself as Harvard Kennedy School, on par with Harvard Business School, Harvard Medical School and Harvard Law School. We drafted a new messaging platform, created a comprehensive style guide, developed a new overview brochure and identity system, concepted a new image campaign and consulted on the internal roll-out strategy.

Officially launched in 2008, the new branding has been widely embraced and declared a success. Alumni, faculty and staff responded positively to the changes, but perhaps the highest praise came from students themselves.

“This is an excellent move, congratulations! It makes it much easier for future graduates to market the school to employers and students,” wrote Gebhard Ottacher, M.P.A. 2009.

“I like the layout of the new Web site, and appreciate the simplification and clarification of the Harvard Kennedy School name,” said Katie Sieben, MC/M.P.A. 2008.

Marcus Tonti, M.P.P./UP 2000, wrote, “I am usually skeptical of so-called ‘branding’ exercises but I have to say I think this is a home run.”