Curtin Uni joins top employer list

Curtin University of Technology came forward as one of the best employer brands in this year's WA Business News Branding Survey, featuring along the large corporate firms and perennial performers Wesfarmers, BankWest, Woodside and RAC.

Curtin came in third position of the top five best employer brands in WA.

Its long-running Curtinnovation campaign, developed by the advertising agency Gatecrasher Advertising in 2003, this year included a series of television ads featuring a number of global locations and recognised corporations presented as potential employers of graduates.

In conjunction with the television campaign, the heavy investment made by Curtin through newspaper recruitment advertising in the past twelve months was also acknowledged by the marketing and advertising sector in the survey responses as an element that improved Curtin's employer brand.

TMP Worldwide WA general manager Rowena Smith said Curtin's innovation theme, which runs through its corporate brand, also runs through its employer brand.

"The recruitment advertising for Curtin University has a strong theme of innovation running throughout - which is also reflective of the university's external corporate brand," she said.

The university's credentials were also boosted this year by its investment in a new world-class Resources and Chemistry precinct with the support of mining giants BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto.

The competition between the universities has been fierce, with Murdoch University and Edith Cowan University also mounting advertising campaigns, while the University of Western Australia has avoided this approach, relying instead on its reputation to attract students.

Murdoch University's "discoverers welcome" campaign, developed by Meerkats, was recognised in this year's branding survey as one of the most improved WA brands.

"Public universities have been spending a lot in the past two years...the result was for Murdoch an increase of 20 per cent of the amount of offers [on demand] going to potential students", Meerkat brand planner Ronnie Duncan said.

Curtin last featured in the 2004 branding survey where it came number four of the emerging brand chart, a year after the university launched its campaign.