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Low Income Housing Fund (LIHF)
In 2001, one of the nation's largest community banking intermediaries faced a major identity crisis: it no longer did what its name described.
For almost twenty years, LIHF helped community development corporations secure funding for various projects throughout the country. Over the last five years, however, funding priorities had shifted to include projects ranging from commercial and workforce development to schools and childcare facilities.
While housing was still at its core, the organization's leadership was looking to impact far more in the coming decades and decided to change its name. They turned to Passion Marketing to guide them through the process.
Process
Our first step was to lead them through a discovery process to uncover the depth of their brand equity in order to focus their re-branding efforts.
Before initiating work, Passion Marketing began by clarifying the client's goals. Through this proactive process, it became clear that name change was not driven because of what The Low Income Housing Fund was funding, but rather what funds were available to it.
As a banking intermediary, certain foundation, corporate, and government resources were unavailable because of a common misperception that the "Low Income Housing Fund" only focused on residential lending.
Research
We began our research by determining key funding target markets and initiating a qualitative research process involving in depth individual interviews with key decisions makers and influencers in the industry.
Results of the study were cross-tabulated to identify trends across the marketplace. These trends were used to focus our strategy.
Brand Equity
It became clear that Low Income Housing Fund had developed a dominant reputation in the marketplace in only twenty years, especially when compared to its two major competitors. However, it was also discovered that they were primarily known by their acronym "LIHF" rather than by their formal name.
This finding was particularly intriguing because it contrasted organizational policy of always referring to the full name "Low Income Housing Fund" with actual, real-life use of the name as "LIHF."
Results
Through our investigative process, important information was gleaned that directly affected decision-making. We were able to make the following recommendations:
- LIHF was to be pushed to the foreground in the marketing of the organization (retaining its current identity and brand equity).
- Simultaneously, LIHF subdivisions would be created such as LIHF's Child Care Facilities Fund and the LIHF Workforce Development Project with separate but related sets of stationery.
In this way, LIHF's brand identity was reinforced and extended providing even greater credibility to the organization and, importantly, unlocking key funding resources for its borrowers.
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