We’re refreshing our identity

Recent research undertaken by the marketing and communications team to better understand people’s perceptions of Solent has led us to an exciting brand positioning refresh project.

The research results showed that awareness of Solent is lower than that of our competitors, and that many of our target audience do not know that we are based in Southampton. The work also revealed that, although our current staff and students identified some of our great strengths, these were not necessarily picked up by our prospective students.

This provides an opportunity to better reflect the confident, vibrant university that we are, and create a brand that is instantly recognisable by our community (and beyond). We want our staff and students to feel proud to work and study at Solent and enjoy a sense of belonging to the City of Southampton.

Before progressing with this brand refresh, we consulted with our staff, students, alumni and the public through workshops, interviews and focus groups to see what they thought of our current brand, to ensure that this project was people-led.

What will be changing?

Planned changes to our visual identity will be the colours, photography style and graphical elements* that we use in our branding. We want to show that we are proud to be Southampton, and our new photography will feature our students in some of the city’s most iconic locations.

Our messaging, and how we talk about ourselves, is key to our brand identity. We aim to reflect our 2025 Strategy – aligning our values and priorities.

*Please see below for some concept artwork

When is this work happening?

Work is underway. Our brand elements, messaging and tone of voice is currently being developed and our new photography will be being captured at the end of May.

A series of brand workshops and drop-in sessions will be advertised soon, open to all staff and students. This will be an opportunity to see the visuals and offer feedback to the marketing and communications team.

The brand refresh is scheduled to be ready to launch at the undergraduate open day on Saturday 10 September 2022. We hope that our new identity will be fully reflected for the 2022/23 academic year, throughout campus, online and in our marketing materials.

Keep an eye on the portal for more updates over the summer period. If you have any initial queries about the brand refresh, please email content@solent.ac.uk