New Brand and Messaging
Bethlehem, PA | Completed 2023
The International Institute for Restorative Practices (IIRP) is the leader in restorative practices education, providing teaching, training, and research in the science of relationships and community. Recently, The Institute’s team aimed to expand its footprint beyond K-12 education and human service and into higher education, organizational culture and leadership, and social and community health sectors.
The issue? Restorative practices is an unfamiliar term and concept to the general public, making it difficult to communicate how it can benefit the community and the importance of implementing it in both personal and professional environments.
The IIRP partnered with GMB to help resolve this disconnect with its core audiences and provide clarity with a new brand and messaging strategy. We then helped The IIRP raise awareness with a digital campaign to promote its Master of Science in Restorative Practices and graduate certificate specializations, as well as updated key parts of The Institution’s website to reflect its new brand and messaging.
THE GOAL:
Raise awareness for The IIRP’s graduate programs and services with consistent, cohesive, and compelling messaging across all platforms that resonates with its core audiences.
THE CHALLENGE:
Educating an audience who may be looking for restorative practices programs like the ones The IIRP offers, but who may not have the terminology to search or identify them.
THE OPPORTUNITY:
As a leader in the field, The IIRP has the responsibility and opportunity to define restorative practices and the power it has to transform communities in a way that that is easily understood and valued by the average person.
For those affecting real change
The IIRP is a pioneer in its space, built for curious minds who want to engage and elevate their community through relationship building, conflict resolution, and education. In our research, we recognized a desire to learn more about restorative practices with the core audiences; however, they lacked the terminology to search for it.
The first step of our campaign was to build a connection between what restorative practices is and what it does, linking the two with a common message that our audience could relate to: Affecting Real Change.
Bridging the messaging gap to think different
Early on in our insights gathering, it became clear that the term “restorative” had become diluted and difficult to define in the marketplace. To reduce confusion and clarify The IIRP’s mission, we crafted messaging that focuses on the benefits of restorative practices and how it can be used to affect real change, restore the future, and heal communities.
Expanding markets
Once the messaging was established, it was time to get it in front of the people who needed to hear it. So, we got to work expanding our reach. Working with The IIRP marketing team, we expanded the digital campaign into Michigan and Texas while continuing to strengthen The IIRP’s brand recognition in its current Northeast markets.
Taking a full-funnel approach
Because ‘restorative practices’ is not a commonly searched term, we implemented a full funnel approach with The IIRP’s digital campaign. This meant looking at the full spectrum of search terms one might use in their research journey, from broader terms about conflict resolution and restorative practices to specific branded institution key words.
Staying top of mind
There are a lot of areas one can apply a master’s degree in restorative sciences: Education. Community engagement. Professional development. We leaned on these additional benefits in a retargeting campaign, focused on re-engaging those who visited the landing page but didn’t convert. Our retargeting ads* highlighted the specializations that The IIRP’s graduate program offered and how they can help our audience affect real change in the areas they were most interested in.
More Engagement.
More Clicks.
More Conversions.
Our strategy was all about expanding opportunities, which resulted in more traffic and engagement for our clients. Our audiences clicked on a variety of CTAs to connect directly with The IIRP, including requesting more information; scheduling calls with admission counselors, and booking visits.
- 15.5+ million impressions
- 57k total clicks
- 1,800+ total conversions
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