Christopher Newport University Issues Communications RFP

The purpose of this Request for Proposal (RFP) is to solicit sealed proposals from qualified contractors to establish a contract through competitive negotiation for the purchase of branding, marketing and communication services for Christopher Newport University (CNU), an Agency of the Commonwealth of Virginia.

Background:

Founded in 1960, over the last 21 years, CNU has transformed from a small, public liberal arts commuter college into a comprehensive residential university in Newport News, Virginia with an enrollment of just over 5,000 full-time students with approximately 4,000 students living on campus.  CNU has rigorous and rewarding academic programs in the liberal arts and sciences through the College of Arts and Humanities, the College of Natural and Behavioral Sciences, the College of Social Sciences, and the Luter School of Business. CNU offers great teaching and small class sizes with an emphasis on leadership, civic engagement and honor.

Scope of Work:

The scope of services includes four (4) major components: research and discovery; brand strategy development, creative concept development and implementation.

1. Research and Discovery
2. Quantitative research exploring awareness of CNU and its programs among key constituents at local, regional and national levels.
3. Qualitative research to determine perceptions regarding CNU and its programs and offerings among target audiences locally, regionally and nationally.
4. Analysis
5. Brand Strategy Development
6. Developing brand-relevant messaging that resonates with key target audiences locally, regionally and nationally.
7. Proposing and implementing a strategy that gains organizational consensus for the brand identity and message and aligns with CNU’s vision and values.
8. Creative Concept Development
9. Proposing realistic marketing strategy and associated tactics that elevates the exposure of CNU to identified audiences. This strategy should include:
10. Paid advertising at a local, regional and national level (include proposed media and reasoning for their selection).
11. Please note that the proposal should include proposed budgets for paid advertising at a level required to meet the objective of national awareness among key constituencies.
12. Tactics for enhancing exposure via earned media.

iii. Optimizing social media marketing opportunities.

1. Evaluating and providing recommendations regarding CNU’s web presence (changes, additions, or enhancements)
2. Proposing multiple ways, other than paid media, to promote CNU and its programs, faculty, visiting lecturers, alumni, research and students.
3. All branding, marketing and promotional materials should work in harmony with existing CNU branding and graphic identity guidelines whenever appropriate and feasible. Additionally, all such material created for analog and digital distribution are to be designed in a manner that can easily incorporated and used by CNU’s Communications and Public Relations team. For these purposes, the agency will provide native Adobe

In-design files and associated assets, including digital files for photography, fonts, illustrations, recordings and video.

4. Implementation

Deploying strategy and creative content through “anchor” pieces like a print ad campaign, videos, or significant pieces that will fully articulate the vision from the creative concept. Pricing for this will depend on what specific deliverables are agreed upon.

Due Date:

May 14th

Address:

Commonwealth of Virginia

Christopher Newport University 1 Avenue of the Arts

Newport News, Virginia 23606

Strong PR firms who may be relevant for this assignment include Ruder Finn or Ketchum PR.