Leading the Way
A disruptive brand campaign to drive applications from China to the University of Liverpool.
Harnessing the University’s newly launched Global Advancement Scholarships, the goal was to drive applications and enrolments from Chinese postgraduate students.
Taking a product focussed bottom-of-funnel campaign brief, we orchestrated something much more expansive to truly stand out from the crowd.
A Celebration of advancement and originality.
Showcasing their inspirational alumni, Leading the Way positioned the University of Liverpool as home to the leaders of the future. A place for world changers and mavericks, for those who think differently and with originality. A powerful and aspirational space for the University to unashamedly own as part of its brand positioning.
The original Redbrick, the University of Liverpool has an impressive 125 year history of cultivating word-leading minds and delivering global firsts.
But how could it leverage this heritage whilst building brand level awareness - whilst also putting Liverpool on the map as a study destination for an international audience?
Brand storytelling on the global stage
A fully integrated campaign targeting China, and translated internationally.
Centred around a piece of storytelling film, Aurora designed a multi-channel campaign ecosystem spanning the full user journey through to conversion.
Informed by key audience insights, our campaign needed to leverage the university’s heritage as we showcased some of the Nobel prize winners and pioneers in their fields amongst their alumni.
Positioning the University of Liverpool as a world leader on the international stage by shining a light on the agents of change making a difference in today’s world, such as wildlife conservationist Megan McCubbin and TV doctor and bestselling author, Dr Amir Khan.
A cut-through campaign for Liverpool & the HE sector
Marketing into China is a unique challenge which requires deep cultural understanding and content created specific to China’s own media channels. We carried out in-depth research looking at successful marketing campaigns into China - and worked extensively with Liverpool’s Chinese staff, their reps in China and Chinese students to understand what would be the most compelling messaging for Chinese students. We created our Aurora defined Culture Map to identify how and where out of sector brands engage with Gen Z Chinese audiences to greatest effect. Drawing on Liverpool’s uniqueness as a city and university which breeds true originals, and its international fame as a city brand.
-
Investing in bold and ambitious marketing was an essential move to deliver the Vice Chancellor’s 2031 vision: a top 100 global ranking position. Currently ranked 176, the marketing department had a monumental challenge on their hands: convincing stakeholders of the need for investment in brand level comms, to create the proof points for bigger international brand marketing. A campaign on this scale was a big step-change for the University. A completely new territory that needed to deliver tangible results.
-
Our insight told us assured success, high calibre and future job prospects are top priority in attracting Chinese students, along with the importance of engaging parents who are closely involved in decision making. Additionally women are increasing to become dominant gender applying to UK institutions. This led us to create a sector disrupting emotional campaign focussed on achievement and leadership, but through a female lens - and with the close involvement of our lead protagonist’s mother.
-
We wrote the story of a Chinese female student who comes to Liverpool to meet her potential, closely supported from China by her proud mother. In Liverpool she finds a place of belonging and achievement.
-
Deployed across organic touchpoints with unique messaging tailored to those in the conversion funnel and an owned hashtag. And translated into a paid media campaign targeting the lucrative Chinese market as a key growth sector. We harnessed budgets to maximum effect, combining digital media into China - and used our unique and highly effective approach to organic amplification centred around engagingLiverpool’s own students, staff and Chinese student ambassadors.
In just one month the campaign blew its KPIs out of the water, surpassing any previous brand campaign by the University.
9.6 Million Impressions
92 thousand clicks
