Divisions’ successful identity campaigns address divergent needs

Jul 29, 2010 9:23:06 AM

Now that Division III is running full speed ahead with activating its strategic-positioning platform and identity initiatives, people might start recognizing some similarities between that effort and another that one of the division's NCAA siblings took five years ago.

That was when Division II embarked on its own strategic-positioning platform, which resulted in a six-attribute identity campaign and a series of initiatives that aligned membership behavior and policy with the division's newfound brand.

To be sure, similarities between the Division II and Division III platforms abound. Each has a positioning statement that emphasizes a complete student-athlete experience, including a competitive and rewarding athletics participation, and immersion in all the other aspects of campus life. Each also comes with six attributes that are either identical or closely related.

Division III also is following avenues similar to Division II in activating its initiative, from the way the platform documents look to the banners, signs and resources available for institutions to co-brand themselves. Though the products differ in appearance, they are being marketed similarly.

Those similarities are no accident. The success that Division II achieved in the activation of its platform, and the success of the activation of the Association-wide platform before that, created a roadmap for Division III to follow. But lest Division III be labeled as a copy-cat, the reasons for each division's campaign are as divergent as their outcomes are similar.

MORE INFORMATION

DIVISION II The hexagon is the primary visual element, representing the six key attributes. The accompanying moniker "I Chose Division II" represents both an individual choice for the student-athlete and a choice for the institution as a membership destination. DIVISION II POSITIONING STATEMENT

DIVISION III Division III has incorporated a modified Mobius strip, which is a three-sided icon that has only one side, and one edge that turns in to itself, thus representing the Division III student-athlete by illustrating the concepts of academics, athletics and extracurricular activities as part of a singular experience. Three D's – discover, develop and dedicate – figure prominently in the division's effort to better describe its purpose. DIVISION III POSITIONING STATEMENT

Mitigating migration

Division II was reacting to what some members viewed as a crisis in 2005 when it convened almost 200 of its presidents and chancellors to bolster the division's self-image. The division was quite often perceived incorrectly as the "middle child" in the NCAA's three-division structure, somewhere between the full-scholarship, high-caliber athletics of Division I and the academically principled yet still competitive participation in Division III.

Division II was losing members to Division I, and some people were attributing the migration to the division's lack of identity – and having to react defensively when others tried to define it.

But that changed at the groundbreaking Presidents and Chancellors Summit in 2005 when members staked out their identity and built their platform.

"Part of the reason for changing from defense to offense for the division was to mitigate migration," said Central Missouri President Charles Ambrose last month before presidents and chancellors gathered again for the third iteration of the Summit. Ambrose was an integral figure in the Division II identity campaign, chairing the Presidents Council during the platform's initial implementation.

"Now here we are today with a membership process that's using the platform to make certain that we discern the alignment between institutional mission and membership in Division II," he said. "There is a much more deliberate engagement with institutions seeking membership that are willing to commit to live out those distinctions. It's 180 degrees from where we were in 2005."

A unified approach

Meanwhile, Division III was comfortable with is longstanding philosophy and academic-focused brand, but rapid growth in the last two decades (despite several membership moratoriums) found the division bursting at its seams and wondering whether all its new members still held true to that identity. That growth in fact prompted Division III to ponder subdividing, or even creating a new division to accommodate some of its approximately 450 members.

That wasn't necessarily an easy discussion, but one that ultimately was beneficial to have, said Division III Vice President Dan Dutcher.

A survey in the spring of 2008 overwhelmingly indicated that Division III members wanted to stay together as a division. Despite the challenges that come with growth, it was clear that Division III wanted to take on those challenges collectively. The Presidents Council responded by articulating 10 issues it felt the division needed to deal with to accommodate the existing and anticipated growth (Division III is expected to be at about 480 schools by 2020).

"The top priority was to be sure that, moving forward, our membership understood the Division III philosophy and was able to articulate it both internally and to external constituents," Dutcher said.

That's why the Division III strategic-positioning platform was developed. While Division II sought to establish an identity, Division III wanted to make sure its members could articulate an identity that already had been assumed.

"We've always had a pretty good sense of who we are as a division and a pretty well-defined set of values, but we haven't articulated them in writing," said current Division III Presidents Council chair Jim Harris of Widener University. "But I think we have lived out these values for some time."

But if Division III knew who it was, why was there a need to market itself better? One reason was legislative. 

"There was a core group that felt there were schools in Division III that were articulating values (through legislative proposals and voting trends) that made them a better fit for Division II," Harris said. "That's where we had the disconnect. That's what led to the need for us to publicly state what we are all about. But these attributes we have identified are what we have lived all along, and by putting them in a written platform, there may be some schools in Division III that may find it more comfortable to be in Division II or Division I."

Dutcher said another reason related to "incomplete" communications.

"We found that Division III schools and conferences supported the division's core beliefs but often did not articulate them to internal or external constituents," he said. "Further, when they did articulate those principles, they often did not link them to the Division III. A school's website, for example, would describe an athletics philosophy or a student-athlete experience that was very consistent with the Division III philosophy but fail to mention that the school was a member of Division III and link the institutional values to those of the division."

And if the Division III initiative was designed to "fix" anything, it was the division being miscast as only the group that didn't award athletics grants-in-aid. While that remains a core tenet of the Division III philosophy, members were bothered with that being the lone identifier of the NCAA's largest group.

"Division III has a unique model," Dutcher said, "and it's fair to say that before now there wasn't a very good understanding of what the division stood for beyond one default identity – which was that Division III is the division that doesn't award athletics scholarships.

"While that indeed is a fundamental tenet of the division that will not change, it was nonetheless difficult for people to consistently describe what the division stood for other than that. We needed to better define our shared values, which led us to develop a positioning platform."

Under one umbrella

So Division III launched its strategic campaign that took on many of the same elements as the Division II plan before it – and of the NCAA branding campaign begun a decade earlier. Accordingly, Harris doesn't dodge the notion that Division III is borrowing some branding and communications tactics from Division II and from the umbrella NCAA. But the reasons for each division's approach vary significantly.

"I admire how Division II has rallied its presidents, and from that Division III can learn some lessons," Harris said. "It's not a surprise that there are so many similarities between the two platforms, since there are a number of similarities among institutions."

And there also are similarities between both divisions' platforms and the NCAA's branding campaign. After all, the tagline of "going pro in something other than sports" resonates most directly in Divisions II and III.

Perhaps the most challenging aspect of each division's identity (including Division I) is defining the integration of athletics into the educational mission – a staple of the overall NCAA branding campaign.

Division I, with its high-profile and nationally televised championships, supports an educational experience for student-athletes who also want to excel at the highest levels of their sport. Division II has incorporated the word "balance" into its mantra, still promising a highly competitive athletics experience for its student-athletes but in a setting that equally values academic excellence. Division III, meanwhile, emphasizes the "proportion" of its student-athlete experience, noting that athletics is only part of the more comprehensive campus offerings for students.

All three divisions have successfully integrated their own athletics/academics focus into the NCAA's broader campaign so that – regardless of division – student-athletes are seen as students first.

For Division II, Ambrose called the effect of the platform "transformative," with the benefits ranging from public acceptance to a better defined membership to stronger financial justification. The platform was so successful that the philosophy statement in the Manual was subsequently altered to reflect its contents. Division II also anchored its community-engagement and game-environment initiatives to the platform.

While the Division III platform is younger, the results figure to be similarly successful.

"The platform was built through presidential leadership, and those same presidents and chancellors are on board to ensure that its implementation has the desired effect," Dutcher said. "Through much of the last decade, the future of the division was not clear. The platform provides a tool to unify the members of Division III around its shared values and philosophy, and to more effectively share that unique model with others."