Like many industries, place marketing has weathered some notorious brand disasters. This 2010 brand video for Downtown St. Louis received criticism for portraying itself as the next über-trendy scene for hipsters and fashionistas – a new New York, perhaps? Or consider Las Vegas. In the 1990s, city marketers tried to rebrand Sin City as a […]
Place brand manager roles are expanding: here’s why and what to do next
“The wider any culture spreads, the thinner it gets.” -Stanley Edgar Hyman, literary critic This maxim – known as The Law of Raspberry Jam – describes a core challenge of destination branding: Without a coherent story and coordinated stakeholders, your brand loses its distinctive flavour. Unfortunately, many destinations spread their messages too thin. When people […]
Do your visitors trust you? Educate them with honesty
Your visitors spend months dreaming about their vacation. They research online, they see promotional material on websites, they read reviews, they plan, and they book. After weeks of increasing anticipation, they finally get on the plane, train, or car and try to have the experience they’ve been waiting for. Will expectations match reality? Every destination […]
Boutique destinations are making a massive impact
In 2015, the Skift travel magazine declared “The Rise of the Boutique Destination” as a trend to watch. This mirrors the message put forth by urban expert Richard Florida, author of “The Rise of the Creative Class”. Florida has predicted the rise of the distinctive city and the people that support its identity, saying, “How […]
Why loyalty management leads to growth
Imagine that for every one hundred arrivals to your destination, one hundred and ten returned next year. Ideally, how many of those would be repeat visits and referrals? Visitor retention is one of three growth engines for destinations (along with visitor acquisition and referral). A higher retention rate can reduce the risk of declining visitation. […]
You’re not as famous as you think
You might be the king or queen of your castle. You’re passionate and creative about your destination’s branding, its unique experiences, its messaging, and the reasons why it is a fantastic place to visit. You work hard to share that message with visitors. But how far does your fame reach? Some destinations truly are world […]
Phygital tourism is here to change your world
In an age of mashups and remixes, the word “phygital” is an apt hybrid. Phygital marketing seeks to seamlessly blend the physical and digital reality through omnichannel communications and experiences. This trend has huge implications for the future of tourism: phygital tourism will affect far more than consumer behaviour, it will also impact the way […]
Meet your visitors’ needs and avoid marketing myopia
In 1960, Theodore Levitt coined the term “marketing myopia” in Harvard Business Review as a cautionary description of a common marketing mistake. Levitt’s concept claims that companies are short-sighted when they view marketing as merely a tool for selling specific products, rather than meeting the needs of their customers. The video below gives a short synopsis […]
Destinations: Beware the better mousetrap fallacy
“Build a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to your door.” This quote attributed to the American poet Ralph Waldo Emerson illustrates a common misconception in business. The “better mousetrap fallacy” is the mistaken belief that a superior product will automatically generate customers, which would remove the need for building that “path […]
Don’t drown in the sea of sameness: A destination branding paradox
Destination marketers tend to believe that good branding is about standing out in the crowd. This is understandable, as traditional marketing training encourages new marketers to create unique, compelling messaging that simply must be heard due to its creativity and emotional resonance. This creates a problem and a classic branding paradox: If everyone tries to […]
3 essential elements of the place brand formula
How does the rest of the world see your destination? Shift perceptions in your favour by defining and communicating your authentic place brand that flows outward from your destination’s DNA. The outer layer of place branding has three essential elements that can help your destination become known for the right reasons. These elements are so […]
Can destinations reconcile competing logos and brands?
Changing a logo is like a divorce. It can be messy, painful and take years to complete. It’s no wonder that some of the most successful destination logos (like those of New York, Paris, Berlin and Spain) have been left untouched for decades – because fundamentally, a whole community must feel ownership of the destination’s […]
Need better visitor stories? Improve your place product
“How was your trip?” The answers to this question are the stories your destination’s visitors and residents tell. Travel has infinite variety, but the resulting stories all have one thing in common: memorable experiences. This means that if your destination marketing organization (DMO) really wants to grow awareness and visitation by telling the right stories […]
A logo is not a brand
Think about your favourite or most unforgettable logos. Whether it’s the Nike swoosh or “I Love NY”, we know logos are important because we remember them and begin to identify with them over time. For destinations, new marketing is about making connections with those specific people who might be interested in exactly what your destination […]
How should destinations respond to Airbnb and the sharing economy?
As more people participate in the new sharing economy, companies like Airbnb, Inc., VRBO and Wimdu are disrupting the travel industry by offering travellers direct access to peer-to-peer accommodation rentals. A surging demand from visitors who want to travel like a local is forcing many destinations and places to respond and balance the needs of […]
Use Place DNA™ to define your destination’s core identity
Place DNA™ is at the core of the three layers of place branding that help destination marketers understand how residents, visitors and potential visitors perceive a place. By articulating the intrinsic character of your destination, Place DNA™ provides an authenticity test for all marketing activities that follow. Identifying the elements of Place DNA™ will help […]
Why destination marketers need to understand Place DNA™
What is the DNA of a place and why is it important? Why is a destination’s DNA relevant to place making, place marketing and destination marketing? Defining Place DNA™ Simply stated, a destination’s Place DNA™ is the definition of its intrinsic character, the meaning that people ascribe to it, or more often, a mixture of […]
How destinations can demonstrate value by using Blue Ocean Strategy
Now that you’ve learned why place marketers should use Blue Ocean Strategy, how can destinations put this into practice and demonstrate value? As the last article explored, most business leaders understand the two common business strategies framed by economist Michael Porter, which demand a choice between creating a high-value product and striving for low-cost implementation. […]
Mexico City demonstrates the power of crowdsourcing
In these times of transition, technology is making direct democracy and co-creation more possible every day. Mexico City has just begun an effort to crowdsource its new constitution, as Iceland did in 2012. Whatever the local political ramifications, this reveals a trend destination marketing organizations (DMOs) should be aware of. As destinations struggle to define […]
Why place marketers should use Blue Ocean Strategy to improve their value proposition
A successful strategy for place marketers needs to focus on value innovation. Blue Ocean Strategy offers a way to do this, and could be an eye-opening concept for those seeking to differentiate their destinations effectively. Most strategists will agree that marketing and business are all about making hard choices. People often think in terms of […]
Strategy is not what you think it is
“For a destination marketing organization (DMO), strategy means formulating a vision for providing lasting, sustainable value for residents, visitors and companies. Strategy is the shortest road between your mission and your vision.” We trust a driver who keeps his or her eyes on the road instead of on the dashboard. Tracking speed and mileage is […]
Overcome disruption with responsive DMO leadership
Some experts will say that they can solve the problems you face within a changing industry, but the best way your destination marketing organization can adapt is through responsive leadership from within. Frank Cuypers, Senior Strategic Consultant for Destination Think!, explains four types of leadership. If you’ve attended enough marketing conferences, there’s a good chance […]
Why place branding needs to be built from the inside
There can be no city branding without citizens and no destination branding without residents. From afar, city and destination branding often looks like Italian lasagna. As district, city, province, region, country and private partner brands combine, their messages stack on top of one another in messy layers. When the layers don’t blend well, it can […]