Importance Adobe Express is a free design software (similar to Canva) available to all campus employees, students, faculty and staff. We have created various on-brand templates to get you started. This guide will break down some of the key features you will need to edit the existing templates. Target Audience  Instructions Best Practices Accessibility As […]

The Illinois brand is a beacon of innovation, excellence and community impact. As a unit leader, your role extends beyond managing daily operations — you are instrumental in using the brand’s values to inspire your team, align staff efforts with the university’s broader mission and goals and lead with a shared sense of purpose. By […]

Importance  Videos with polished visuals convey your message in a professional way while helping to maintain your audience’s attention.  Target Audience  Instructions Find Locations and Practical Light  Use Lighting Equipment  Discover Rule of Thirds, Symmetry and Other Compositional Tips  Additional Resources  The diagram below showcases a simple lighting setup. Contact  Video Services, Strategic Communications and […]

Importance Communicating in a coherent and consistent manner is important to strengthening the Illinois brand. Our messaging is stronger when we utilize a consistent editorial style. Target Audience Brand Guidance Common Editorial Questions How do we refer to the UNIVERSITY? Do not use UIUC. Do not capitalize “university” when it is used on its own. […]

Importance Aligning with the Illinois brand promotes cohesion and consistency. It also helps to build trust with key university audiences. When we represent ourselves as one, both the brand and accompanying designs are strengthened. Target Audience Brand Guidance Resources Designer Listserv Log into the University of Illinois mailing lists site using your campus login. You […]

Importance A consistent visual aesthetic helps in building a strong and memorable brand identity. This training will provide you with the tools to maximize the Illinois brand and enhance your university social media accounts’ aesthetics.  Target Audience  Brand Guidance  Instructions 1. Unique Identities within the Illinois Brand The Illinois brand platform establishes the foundation for […]

Importance As communicators, it’s crucial to navigate the complexities of branding on various social media platforms. Here are key questions to guide you through the process, ensuring a consistent and impactful representation of the Illinois brand platform on social media. Target Audience Brand Guidance The Essentials 1. Creating branded messaging 2. Understanding our audience(s) 3. […]

In the heading above, give the training topic you are documenting a descriptive but concise name. This title should match the title of your document.  Importance Add 1-2 sentences here that explains why this training topic is important and how it contributes to the Illinois brand.  Target Audience  List the target audience in this section […]

Importance At a university rich with special events, varied audiences and institutional success stories, communications professionals craft messages that inform and resonate in a variety of contexts. Different communications require different approaches to deliver messages that align with the Illinois brand and connect with your audience. This written training will give you a sense of […]

Importance Starting any project can be daunting, especially when there are many vital and dynamic parts, like on your unit’s home website. By setting up the desired deliverables from the beginning, you can position your project(s) for success. Websites encompass almost every part of the brand through colors, fonts and visual elements, but also the […]

Importance Taking extra care to make your audio excellent will help immerse your audience in your video, impacting how clearly your message comes across.  Target Audience  How-To   Audio Capture  Recording  Dialogue Editing  Music  Audio Mixing/Mastering  Tips and Tricks Contact  Video Services, Strategic Communications and Marketing, videoservices@illinois.edu

Importance The portraits we take of our university community are a representation of the Illinois brand. This written training aims to offer strategies to create dynamic portraits with simple tools. Target Audience Brand Guidance Key Strategies Strive for Ideal Light Aim for a light source that illuminates their eyes. If there isn’t soft, flattering light […]

Importance Title tags help search engines understand what a page is about. More importantly the title tag denotes to what a page will contain and where that page is in the information architecture of a website and the Illinois system as a whole. Target Audience Definitions and Brand Guidance Instructions For publish.illinois.edu websites or WordPress […]

Importance This written training is to help web developers insert iconography and graphic elements in your website using the shared brand web assets and CSS. This makes locating the icon you want to use easier and faster. Target Audience Brand Guidance Instructions 1. Visit the shared brand web assets and collect the corresponding link tag to […]

Importance  Using the Illinois Image Database can help amplify the Illinois brand. The Illinois Image Database is a curated collection of strong, dynamic photographs taken by the photographers in Strategic Communications and Marketing. These images represent the Illinois experience and provide accessible imagery for campus communicators to tell the Illinois story in an authentic way.  […]

Importance This training is essential to ensure all departmental newsletters reflect a cohesive and powerful representation of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Aligning with the university’s brand standards helps maintain a consistent message, amplifies the university’s voice and strengthens its overall identity. Target Audience  Definitions and Brand Guidance How-to/Instructions Step 1: Define your communications goals […]

Importance Marketing analytics is the tracking and analysis of data derived from marketing efforts, aimed at achieving quantitative goals. Through this process, units gain insights to enhance marketing channels, boost the ROI of marketing initiatives and shape future strategies. Utilizing technology and analytical methods on marketing data, units understand audience behaviors, resource allocation and make […]

Importance Project management is the discipline of planning, organizing and overseeing the execution of a project from initiation to completion. Project management aims to achieve the project objectives while efficiently utilizing resources and meeting stakeholder expectations. The principles of project management apply to any discipline, including marketing and communications. Project management principles can help marketers […]

Importance The quality of our news writing influences how external audiences, including news media personnel, view Illinois as a brand and as an institution. Media perception can determine whether and how the university and Illinois research are covered. Target Audience Brand Guidance Highlighting the Brand Pillars: Show, Don’t Tell Tips and Tricks: Avoid hyperbole, exaggeration […]

Importance: Marketing and communications professionals are using analytics to track how their websites are performing. Different tools give different insights about your audience, such as demographic information, what people search to find you, what buttons people click on your website and more. You can install multiple analytics tools, but if you use WordPress there is […]

Importance The university brand contains several shared visual elements provided to help create a common connection while telling the wide array of stories represented by our university. The Block I frame is a simple and flexible way to display your images or content and visually tie to the Illinois brand. We provide images of many […]

Importance The Illinois brand has its own distinctive personality, voice and tone — our strengths and characteristics expressed in human terms. Our brand personality and voice are an extension of our brand pillars: innovation, community, momentum and discovery. They reflect the character of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and help people understand the heart and […]

Importance Choosing the web host for your website can seem confusing and difficult at first. What really is shared Hosting, Cloud Hosting, cPanel or GoDaddy? In this written training, we’ll outline what types of web hosting there are versus a company that provides a web hosting service. We’ll also look at the pros and cons […]