The higher education system in the Republic of Croatia has been going through a reform process since the adoption of the Bologna declaration, resulting in the emergence of a great number of private higher education institutions that lack the long tradition upheld by public higher education institutions. In order to gain trust of potential students to continue their education at one of them, marketing orientation has become indispensable. The branding process as part of the marketing concept in private higher education is a long-term process requiring that an institution act in two directions. The first one requires the development of unique and effective communication, providing information on the study programmes for potential students in the higher education selection process. The second one requires observation of factors (perceived quality, brand awareness, brand association, brand loyalty, other proprietary) that affect brand building of a private higher education institution, simultaneously contributing to creating a competitive edge on the market. Therefore, testing the possibility of applying the existing branding models in economy to higher education was of scientific interest. Starting from Aaker's model of brand equity, the aim of this dissertation was to determine the factors of successful branding of private higher education institutions. With the purpose of accomplishing this aim, which also brought about the dissertation hypotheses, an empirical research study was conducted via survey questionnaires. The research regards a study of factors affecting brand building of a private higher education institution, and it was conducted on a sample of 201 students of the first, second and third year of undergraduate study programmes and the first and second year of graduate study programmes. The part of research relating to the recognition of a private higher education institution was conducted on a sample of 1,132 students as they enrolled in their respective undergraduate study programmes. The obtained results indicate the applicability of Aaker's model of brand equity on higher education. The most significant factors for successful branding in the area of private higher education were the following: quality of the study programme, price to gained knowledge ratio, recognition of external identity elements, attitude of both teaching and non-teaching staff toward students, location and design of premises. The recognition of a private higher education institution increases with the implementation of an integrated marketing communication strategy oriented toward future students. The most significant role in its achievement is word-of-mouth (by students, teachers and graduates), together with the official web page of the higher education institution. Other information sources (presentations in secondary schools, advertising, social networks) were shown to be less significant, and do not influence the decision-making process directly, but certainly impact the building of the positive brand image of the higher education institution.