The U is adding new tools to its rucksack in a quest to boost national awareness of Utah’s flagship university. University Marketing and Communications launched an updated brand guide with enhanced language, images and messaging prompts. The guide aligns with the university’s new strategy, Impact 2030 and positions the U to shine on the national stage ahead of the 2034 Olympic Winter Games.

“The more aligned we are—between Athletics, U of U Health, and main campus—the more we elevate the whole brand of the university,” said Chief Experience Officer Andrea Thomas, who oversees the U’s brand. “We want to spend the next several years using these tools to build knowledge about the U so that when the spotlight is on us during the 2034 Winter Olympics, we’ll already be known on a national level, and it will elevate our exposure.”

The expanded brand guide was created in collaboration with U of U Health and Utah Athletics, synchronizing positioning, values and strategy. The brand website, brand.utah.edu, includes the brand pillars, new storytelling mandatories and marketing goals. The site also includes communications resources, such as an editorial style guide, top facts and figures about the U,  boiler plates and presentation templates—including an externally-focused template with highlights about the U and its surrounding area. Additional tools, including updated colors and fonts, will be added to the site when they are approved.

These resources are specifically targeted toward staff at the U who work in marketing and communications roles, however, they are also beneficial for all staff, students, faculty, and the media. The virtual meeting backgrounds, email signature builder and presentation templates—which are used across campus—are a main source of traffic for the site on a regular basis.

A key element of the brand guide describes the U’s brand positioning—this is the lens through which the community may see various campaigns emerging. The U’s positioning statement identifies three main themes: rooted in connection; climbing higher, together; and beyond the summit, which provide an umbrella for the creation of individual campaigns within those lenses. With this positioning in mind, the U created an outreach campaign in the fall called “the Mountains We Climb,” to introduce the U to a national audience and its Big 12 peers. That campaign was followed by “Worth the Climb,” which reaches out to graduate students. Both campaigns have so far been highly successful at generating positive feedback and gaining attention.

“We are using the metaphor of our natural surroundings to be able to talk about the impact we can have and the resiliency it requires to reach the summit,” Thomas said. “When you think about the lofty goals and aspirations of the U to become a top-10 public university with unsurpassed societal impact, those summits become a vantage point to see even greater peaks. We will keep climbing until we reach our goals.”