World Food Festival=Free=Get There
October 8th, 2010 § Leave a Comment
In lieu of one long post, this week you are getting two short posts! You can thank my work schedule for this, and thankfully, as the week wraps up, my productivity has lasted and I am free for a weekend full of no obligations and beautiful weather—and the U.S. Cellular World Food Festival in Des Moines. This festival is one of several put on by the rock stars at the Downtown Events Group, and consists of food and beers from around the world, complete with live entertainment and shopping.
The Food Festival is my favorite event of the year, and I am very excited to get down there to start tasting and drinking my way around the world. Fall is one of the best event seasons, and the weather this year has really held up nicely, making the perfect setting for good food and friends. If you live in Des Moines, check it out at www.worldfoodfestival.org and come down to the East Village and see what you can find for yourself.
If you don’t live here, think about the positive effects that a festival like this can have on your place branding initiatives. Festivals are a huge opportunity to create local traditions, showcase local fare and goods and create a podium for you to tell others how good it is to be in your place. People get excited about festivals, and more often than not they get news coverage in local outlets. Next week I plan on doing a longer post on the positive place branding effects that events can have, along with a guest post on the topic. But for now, relax, enjoy the weekend and get to the Food Festival!
New, New Orleans
August 27th, 2010 § 3 Comments
I love New Orleans. I have only visited once, but from all of the information that I have read and all of the things I have seen, New Orleans is one truly special and resilient place brand—which is why I included it as a case study in my thesis and why I am coming back to it now, 5 years after Katrina hit. New Orleans is a city that deals well with change. It was once, but wasn’t always, the city we now know and love and it takes a lot of continuous work to ensure that it remains “The Big Easy.” After all of the work put in, pre-Katrina New Orleans rose to be one of the most visited cities in the United States. Make no mistake, place branding and economic development played a huge role in the success of New Orleans. Paired with the natural setting and history involved, this city became an unstoppable force in the tourism world.
Economic development drove many of the factors that made New Orleans success possible. If you are interested in that process or history, there are many articles available and I would be happy to provide some article references that I used for my thesis (which would be exciting, as a request would be my first blog-related email). However, since I realize that most of you aren’t place branding geeks I will not force you to read more about the ec-dev portion. The other, and more interesting, thing that makes New Orleans’ brand so strong is that it has so much to offer every visitor—from the young to the old. By the time that a visitor gets everything accomplished in the Big Easy, if possible, it is likely they’ll want to start over again. From food to music to sports and scenery (Mardi Gras, anyone?), you have to go to understand the rich history and cultural charm of a city like this.
The above information is why the below is so meaningful. We all remember when Katrina hit, and devastated New Orleans in a way that made us wonder if she would ever return. Well as you can see from many of the news articles today, New Orleans has a new breath of life. But it isn’t quite there, yet. And now faced with the oil spill disaster it is unclear once again what will become of this beauty. Rebuilding is hard, and rebuilding a brand is hard too. There is often much more scrutiny when a disaster hits and a city must decide what takes precedence in order to get life back to what it was for everyone. I am not here to say whether New Orleans is in the right, but I am here to say I am so happy they are trying. If you love New Orleans too, you can contribute to help save it. And know this—as long as there are still people traveling, there will still be people traveling to New Orleans.
Citizen place branding: New Jersey
August 4th, 2010 § Leave a Comment
Photo credit: Destination360 Jersey Shore
We have all heard of citizen journalism and what a powerful impact it has had on the world of news. So it shouldn’t be surprising that now we are seeing cases of citizen place branding. Enter case number one (that I have stumbled upon, not ever). New Jersey is not always at the top of everyone’s radar, but with the return of Jersey Shore the buzz about the garden state is back. And whether you watch the show or not, you probably know that the image portrayed of Jersey is not the most flattering—but definitely the most stereotypical. Jersey Shore is centered around a set of too tan, too loud Italian Americans that are out for themselves—and usually a good time. This image is mirrored in a host of other shows about Jersey that are on television right now, including Jersey Couture and The Real Housewives of New Jersey. And while all these shows tell the same story, a concerned group of New Jersey citizens have something else to say.
They think the garden state is pretty awesome. And they have banded together to create a website to tell you, and me, just that. Check out www. http://jerseydoesntstink.com/, and you will see a very interesting and well put together case about why Jersey, in fact, doesn’t stink. Started by New Jersey-based auto insurance-company High Point, the concept is spreading like wildfire through social networks, the news and through visits to their site. The site’s intro reads:
Are you sick of defending your state against wisecracks? If one more person asks if you’re from Joisey, are you going to snap? WE ARE! If you’re from New Jersey you have something inside you no other state could possibly understand: JERSEY PRIDE. It’s time for all of us to come together and stand up for our great state. IT’S TIME TO SHOW THE WORLD: JERSEY DOESN’T STINK!
And as you browse the content, you might actually see that they are right. They are committed to showing what it is their state has to offer, without embellishments, without stereotypes and with real people’s testimonies. Brilliant. What an original thought, yet one that not many people bring to the table. This works because it is real. No one paid for them to do this, they believe what they are saying is the truth and that other people should know, too. This makes me want to visit New Jersey 10 times more than an ad spot sponsored by the governor’s office, because I truly believe that these people are passionate about their state.
This post is a homage to the fact that honest people who are engaged in a brand can move a place brand to the next level. I just attended a meeting of the Iowa AMA, where John Moore spoke about word of mouth marketing. He was a really interesting and entertaining speaker, but he was also so knowledgeable. And he told us this: brand ambassadors use word of mouth to tell others what they think. I believe other people over a marketing department. And according to WOMMA 20-50% of people use word of mouth to make purchasing decisions. So take the advice of New Jersey and John Moore: be truthful, engage brand ambassadors and most of all recognize that every place, no matter of the stereotypes, can have a strong and successful place brand.
The value of original
July 16th, 2010 § Leave a Comment
I just signed the lease for a new apartment. It is old, it has a stove with three burners and the kitchen is tiny. But you know what? I like it. And do you know why? It’s original. We must have looked at 15 different apartments (I know some of you think this is not that many, my girlfriend included, but I had a lower number in mind) and in the end it all came down to where we would feel the most comfortable. And it surprised even us, that we chose the apartment we chose. Aptly dubbed the castle, it is old and unique and quiet and perfect for us. But so was the brand new one downtown with the stainless steel appliances, pool and 14th floor view—so we thought. Right about now you are probably asking yourself what this has to do with place branding. And you’re in luck, I’ll tell you.
Original is priceless. People do not want to go (or live) somewhere that is just like everywhere else. The condo downtown was just the same as all the others, and it was overselling what it had to offer. To be truly sought out, you have to own what you are good at and let the rest fade away. There will always be better imitators, but they will never be able to compete with what you have to offer—if you are original. Think about it. Do you see more people excited about going shopping in old downtown shopping districts, or strip malls on the side of the interstate? You’re right, downtown, and a lot of time you will find that this type of atmosphere is where truly unique vendors are. Because they feel like they are in their element, they own what they know to be their strengths. You always hear about a priceless piece of art not a priceless print at Gordman’s, and you know why—I won’t say it.
Now you may be saying: But Jake, what about Disney? They are about as commercial as you can get and they are still immensely popular. And while that is true, they built their empire on being original. They did things first, and they did those things best. And if you think about it, they create many of their attractions and shows on unique experiences—take downtown Disney at Disney World, Epcot or even the movie Toy Story. All of these things focus on some aspect of being original, whether that is the shopping scene, the country experience or even the use of animation. Disney mass produces original, but they embrace it and it works.
In the end, what really matters is that you are honest. Honest in the fact that you know what your strengths are, what your weaknesses are and how you can play them appropriately to create the overall picture. The castle is not new, or trendy, but it doesn’t try to be. It is old and quirky and it was comfortable, and in the end those things won us over.
For brands, experience is essential
July 1st, 2010 § Leave a Comment
People want to buy experiences, and as a place you need to be in the business of selling them. Visitors want to know that they are going somewhere not for the “I love Xplace” t-shirt, but for the parasailing, fine dining, white water rafting, quirky neighborhoods etc. These things are not tangible, but they are the things that drive people’s travel decisions. This is difficult for some places/people to swallow. You might argue that people choose vacation destinations based on shopping, and shopping begets tangible items so the experience theory is wrong. But I would say that they chose that destination based on the shopping experience—being able to go to many exclusive shops, eating in nice restaurants that usually accompany said shops and being around people who are holding themselves to the same experience standard. Sure when they go home they have that shirt they bought, but that item is just a segue into a story about the experience—I got this shirt at Saks, and they gave us chocolate in the dressing room and then we ate a delicious lunch and then we blah, blah, blah. See, the tangible faded after the initial introduction, but the experience lasted for the rest of the conversation.
This is an important lesson for places to learn, and even more important is the fact that messaging, experience and upkeep must bein-synch. If you have read the posts below, you know that I am a huge believer in the fact that brands need to live up to promises. Flashy campaigns get initial responses, but once a brand doesn’t live up to expectations it is doomed for failure. I was reading this article about brands that have talked the talk, but not walked the walk. Very interesting points, and all relevant to the idea that in order to be trusted and valued as a brand, you have to be real. And even when real is ugly, if you hold yourself to the standards that you would expect other companies to have, then you will weather the storm in a much better fashion.
Take BP. I know, I know, everyone is using BP. But, the article points out that they recently changed their slogan to “Beyond Petroleum” touting their green energy initiatives (and inadvertently touting their environmental consciousness). Then the gulf oil spill comes up and they falter, big time, erasing the confidence in what was a strong brand image. They did not live up to the talk, and in essence provided a bad experience for consumers—both in the actual spill and in the way they handled it. This has happened to dozens of big brands, but another interesting one is Starbucks. They had it right from the beginning, and they knew that people came to Starbucks for the experience—not the coffee. People can get good coffee at a lot of places, but when you go to Starbucks you get the unique, eclectic coffee house experience wherever you are. Then they started to grow, and when they did they forgot about the experience. Business told them it was about the coffee, and they over expanded and lost what made their brand unique. Now they have learned their lesson, and are going back to the experience. It works.
In essence, experience is the most important piece of the puzzle, along with having the conviction to make sure that the experience you provide or the way that you talk about your brand is the truth. If it’s not, people will find out. And they will be mad. If it is the truth, people will be impressed and ready to integrate you brand into their lives, which is the goal of every brand. Every place or thing has unique qualities, and the trick is to use them together in a way that provides more than just tangible benefit—build that experience. Once you know what it is about your destination that is special, and how to market it and make sure that it stays intact, you will reap the benefits of your labor and people will be telling their neighbors about the experience you had to offer.
Brand Audience: Bored or floored?
June 20th, 2010 § 2 Comments
The other day I posted about how important stakeholders are in the place branding process. Now chances are, if you found my blog, you already know the huge role that audience plays in any branding or communication effort. But here’s the thing, in branding the audience is so essential that they are the brand. If your audience doesn’t buy your brand, then they wont live it. And if they won’t live it, other people won’t catch wind of it. And if it isn’t being lived or spread, it’s dead.
This is troubling to some people– especially people who have dedicated their time (or even lives) to brands that have failed– because your audience is not always apparent. You may not know who they are, what they look like or what they want, and that makes failing very easy. If your audience doesn’t like your brand, it could mean back to the drawing board. Sometimes the brand needs some tweaking and can be re-released. Sometimes the brand is dead and a new approach needs to be taken. In either of the cases, your audience should be the one behind the wheel, telling you what route to go and why. Here’s an interesting post on the differences in branding, albeit not place branding, between Microsoft and Apple. Why does one brand struggle while the other flourishes? I’d say its the understanding of the audience.
This idea of audience plays an important role in our own lives, as well. Personal brands are something that have been coming up more and more in recent conversations, especially with the job market the way that it is. Your personal brand is becoming a way for you to open doors, or close them, and should be given the same type of consideration as a place brand or product brand would be. It is important to take your stakeholders into perspective when building a personal brand, because you never know what is coming next. You may think that it won’t matter that you posted pictures of binge drinking (buzz word) on Facebook until you don’t get a job because of it. Or that you ranted and raved in the comment section of a blog until you find out that blog is written by a client. You get the idea. Brands are meant to be enjoyed, lived and spread. Stakeholders are the medium through which that happens. Do right by your place (product, etc.) AND your audience in most any branding situation, and success will follow shortly behind.
Three lessons from Times Square
June 17th, 2010 § Leave a Comment
Place branding is not like branding candy. With candy, you need to make sure that kids want to eat it. If kids want to eat it, management will like it because it increases sales. If it increases sales, stockholders will like it because they get more money. Get the picture? WIth a place, however, there are many more stakeholders and those stakeholders are not all in the process for the same goal. This is a delicate balance, and sometimes things that seem to be a great fit for one group may be a terrible cause for concern in another. Enter Times Square. Some may not know this, but Times Square is a great story of place branding success for NYC–but, ask any New Yorker how they feel about it and you’ll most likely hear another story. What lessons can we learn from place branding in Times Square?
1. Place branding is a catalyst for change. Times Square was seedy and run down before the 1980′s, when the mayor took it in his hands to make it a cleaner and safer neighborhood. The tool he used was not a shovel, it was legislation. This (among other factors) changed the landscape for the better. The results? 26 million visitors a year.
2. All parties need to be involved. While I think that the transformation has been hugely successful, there are many New Yorkers who do not feel this way–trust me. Why is this? Because not everyone was considered in the branding process. The mayor did not ask the locals what they wanted for their neighborhood, and while many of them might have wanted change it could be that change (and the rising prices it caused) that drove them out of the neighborhood all together. Locals are key when branding, because if locals do not believe the brand then no one else will. A major point of concern for locals is the ”disneyfication” of their neighborhoods. “It’s a nice place to visit, but I wouldn’t want to live there.” Well guess what, locals do have to live there, so check with them to get their input.
3. A brand is only as successful as the product. You may be fooled to buy the candy mentioned above one time, if the slogan is catchy. But when you eat that candy and it tastes like a foot, you are not going to buy it again, no matter what the wrapper says. This is also true in place branding. A place must refelct its brand or people will start to catch on and find the next best thing. This is an ongoing process. Once you are brand worthy, it takes maintenance, you must work at keeping what you have earned. Just because a brand is built, it must not be left to wither.
Overall, Times Square is an interesting study in place branding, as well as tourism and American history. Many of the triumphs and problems faced here are commonplace in any place branding endeavor. And it just so happens that if you work for change and you keep it up, your brand will speak for itself.
