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Brand and Identity

Place DNA™ airs resident viewpoints to aid tourism planning in Big Sky, Montana

January 19, 2018 by David Archer Leave a Comment

Place DNA™ airs resident viewpoints to aid tourism planning in Big Sky, Montana

Can you define your destination’s community identity? Do you know your residents’ greatest hopes and fears about tourism, and do they impact your planning? There can be no destination branding without residents. To build lasting credibility and authenticity, a destination needs to work outward from its identity. This means identifying and articulating the core of […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Day Trip, DMO Value Proposition, Topic: Place DNA Tagged With: Candace Carr Strauss, frank cuypers, place dna, Topic: Place DNA, Visit Big Sky

Fight your DMO’s identity crisis with Place DNA™

November 3, 2017 by William Bakker Leave a Comment

Fight your DMO’s identity crisis with Place DNA™

Who do you think you are and why does it matter? In the contemporary destination marketing landscape, the best destination marketing organizations (DMOs) not only have a solid understanding of their destination’s identity but know how this foundation intricately shapes the value they offer. Misalignment can lead to the wrong expectations from visitors and residents […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Day Trip, DMO Value Proposition, Topic: Place DNA Tagged With: destination experience, place brand, place dna, Topic: Place DNA, word of mouth

RTO4’s unique destination marketing approach

October 9, 2017 by Think! Staff Leave a Comment

RTO4’s unique destination marketing approach

Back in 2014, Destination Think! worked closely with Regional Tourism Organization Four Inc. for the Province of Ontario, Canada (RTO4) to define their Place DNA™ as a catalyst towards sustainable destination development and regional collaboration. Several years on we thought we’d check in. In this guest column, RTO4’s Chief Marketing Officer and Chief Operations Officer […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Checking In, Destination Development, Topic: Place DNA, Uncategorized Tagged With: Destination Animation Fund, experience development, place dna, RTO4, Topic: Place DNA, visitor experiences

Do your visitors trust you? Educate them with honesty

May 3, 2017 by Frank Cuypers Leave a Comment

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 […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Consumer Engagement, Long Haul, Topic: Visitor Centres

Boutique destinations are making a massive impact

April 5, 2017 by Frank Cuypers Leave a Comment

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 […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Day Trip, DMO Value Proposition Tagged With: amsterdam marketing, boutique, eindhoven, estonia, place dna, restaurant australia, tel aviv global, tour of flanders

Does your brand lack impact? Consider commercial partners

March 31, 2017 by William Bakker 2 Comments

Does your brand lack impact? Consider commercial partners

The stories of your destination are the essence of its promotion. Visitors, residents, stakeholders, and your organization shape visitor perception through word of mouth. Collectively, these stories form a key component of your destination’s brand. Commercial brands are also a powerful source of stories about a place. Brands that clearly originate from a place, or […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Day Trip, DMO Value Proposition Tagged With: Arc’teryx, Cristina Mateo, Destination British Columbia, Gildo Seisdedos, Ikea, sweden, switzerland tourism

Don’t fear democracy: Learn from Vancouver’s logo woes

March 1, 2017 by David Archer Leave a Comment

Don’t fear democracy: Learn from Vancouver’s logo woes

The City of Vancouver, Canada has been taking heat for its new wordmark design. An open letter signed by over one hundred members of the local design community has derided the “misguided process” that led to the logo’s approval. The letter represents that sector’s passionate viewpoint that the logo does not reflect Vancouver’s unique culture, […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Destination Leadership, Re-fuel Tagged With: eindhoven, peter kentie, place dna, Vancouver

You’re not as famous as you think

February 14, 2017 by Frank Cuypers Leave a Comment

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 […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Day Trip, Strategy & Performance Measurement Tagged With: brand architecture, collaboration, endorsed branding, mono destination

What would planet Earth miss if your destination didn’t exist?

January 27, 2017 by Think! Staff Leave a Comment

What would planet Earth miss if your destination didn’t exist?

It’s a difficult but important question. In an extremely competitive tourism industry, differentiation is vital as destinations envision a valuable end-to-end experience for their visitors. Frank Cuypers offered a bold vision for the future of destination marketing (along with some important and sometimes existential questions) at the Social Media Tourism Symposium held in New Orleans […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Day Trip, Organizational Models

Unique partnership with National Geographic helps Pocono Mountains residents tell local stories

December 22, 2016 by David Archer Leave a Comment

Unique partnership with National Geographic helps Pocono Mountains residents tell local stories

People of the Pocono Mountains know the value of tourism. One in three residents has a connection to the travel and hospitality industry, and this four-county region of the U.S. state of Pennsylvania plays host to 25 million visitors per year. Locals recently became even more connected to tourism through an innovative campaign in partnership […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Checking In, Innovation & Trends Tagged With: carl wilgus, forum 2016, geotourism, national geographic, pocono mountains

What is Place DNA™? Here’s your essential reading list

December 20, 2016 by Thomas Sprangers Leave a Comment

What is Place DNA™? Here’s your essential reading list

Destination marketers need to understand the different types of value that a place can offer. This understanding starts with clearly defining a place’s intrinsic character, also known as Place DNA™. DMOs that build their branding on a true community identity will be able to improve the experience and the value they bring to their stakeholders. […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Day Trip, DMO Value Proposition, Topic: Place DNA Tagged With: gold coast tourism, place brand, place dna

Destinations: Beware the better mousetrap fallacy

December 16, 2016 by Frank Cuypers 3 Comments

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 […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Day Trip, DMO Value Proposition Tagged With: brand

Don’t drown in the sea of sameness: A destination branding paradox

November 30, 2016 by Frank Cuypers 4 Comments

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 […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, DMO Value Proposition, Seat 16B Tagged With: branding, charleroi, hotelling's law, iceland

Lifeline in the Pacific: Palau’s pristine vision for success means managing tourism expectations

November 22, 2016 by Think! Staff Leave a Comment

Lifeline in the Pacific: Palau’s pristine vision for success means managing tourism expectations

The Republic of Palau is a small island nation with remarkable tourism experiences, and the world is taking notice. Palau is a magnet for divers searching for the some of the world’s best conditions, and boasts many more natural wonders like the astounding Jellyfish Lake, Milky Way lagoon and the Rock Islands Southern Lagoon. The […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Checking In, Destination Development, Topic: Sustainable Tourism Tagged With: Topic: Sustainable Tourism

3 essential elements of the place brand formula

November 3, 2016 by Frank Cuypers Leave a Comment

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 […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Day Trip, DMO Value Proposition, Topic: Place DNA Tagged With: branding, place brand, place dna, Topic: Place DNA

Learn about Seville’s vision to collaborate with residents, rebrand and join the top tourism cities in Europe

October 21, 2016 by Think! Staff 2 Comments

Learn about Seville’s vision to collaborate with residents, rebrand and join the top tourism cities in Europe

Welcome to Seville, where the streets are full of life, cultural wonders, and an increasing number of visitors. The city now seeks new ways to manage its destination. How can Seville manage tourism growth in a healthy way to avoid the overcrowding of Barcelona and other cities like it? The new path forward for Seville […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Checking In, DMO Value Proposition Tagged With: Antonio Jiménez Ruiz, Barcelona, rebranding, Seville, spain

Does a brand make a difference? Nashville refined “Music City” to the tune of 60+ straight months of growth and counting.

October 10, 2016 by Think! Staff Leave a Comment

Does a brand make a difference? Nashville refined “Music City” to the tune of 60+ straight months of growth and counting.

  For tourism in Nashville, Tennessee, music is the sound of success. The city’s latest “Music City” branding efforts have helped amplify and augment Nashville’s identity as a creative hub, which starts with music but also includes areas like cuisine and entrepreneurship. (“Silicon Valley of the music business,” anyone?) This creative combo has struck a […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Checking In, Destination Leadership Tagged With: brand, brand identity, community and collaboration 2016, leading thinkers

How Game of Thrones helped tourism invade Ireland

September 21, 2016 by John Freeman 2 Comments

How Game of Thrones helped tourism invade Ireland

“Views To Die Horribly For.” It’s not your typical tourism slogan, but when a major television show is filmed in your destination, your DMO needs to throw typical out of the window. 75 percent of scenes from Game of Thrones are filmed in scenic Ireland, and the team at Tourism Ireland has turned the global […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Day Trip, Innovation & Trends Tagged With: ciaran doherty, game of thrones, television, tourism ireland

Can destinations reconcile competing logos and brands?

September 8, 2016 by Frank Cuypers 1 Comment

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 […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Destination Leadership, Seat 16B Tagged With: brand identity, brand management, frank cuypers, logo, strategy

Need better visitor stories? Improve your place product

August 26, 2016 by Frank Cuypers Leave a Comment

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 […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Day Trip, DMO Value Proposition, Topic: Place DNA Tagged With: brand, Destination British Columbia, DNA, ostend, place product, Topic: Place DNA, USUS, visit flanders

Building a brand that people want to share

August 25, 2016 by Elena Schelfhaut Leave a Comment

Building a brand that people want to share

Effective storytelling is the key to building a powerful and coherent city brand that people connect with and share. So how can destination marketers tackle this challenge and create a branding campaign that people naturally want to tell their friends about? Amsterdam Marketing’s Digital Media Manager, Charel van Dam spoke at the 2015 Social Media […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Day Trip, Destination Leadership Tagged With: amsterdam marketing, brand, charel van dam, i amsterdam

Don’t build your destination’s brand through advertising

August 24, 2016 by Rodney Payne 3 Comments

Don’t build your destination’s brand through advertising

Andrew Hardeman of the media and marketing site Mumbrella advises that marketers “need to focus more on improving the customer experience rather than emotional storytelling at scale, […] because – despite what we may think – most consumers don’t care about having an emotional connection to brands.” A strong destination brand isn’t built through advertising […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, DMO Value Proposition, Re-fuel Tagged With: brand, promotion, storytelling, word of mouth

A logo is not a brand

August 15, 2016 by Frank Cuypers 2 Comments

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 […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Day Trip, Destination Leadership Tagged With: brand, brand identity, logo

Gold Coast Tourism rebrands by unearthing its destination DNA

August 11, 2016 by Andrea Moreton Leave a Comment

Gold Coast Tourism rebrands by unearthing its destination DNA

In an extremely competitive and ever-changing travel industry, destination marketers know the importance of developing their brand in a way that resonates with its target audience. Gold Coast Tourism is no exception and recognized the need to update their brand after seeing a fundamental shift in their audience. Since the launch of its “Gold Coast, […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Checking In, Destination Leadership, Topic: Place DNA Tagged With: brand, DNA, gold coast tourism, jan hutton, place dna, Topic: Place DNA

Letting go of brand control: Why the Swedish Tourist Association empowers residents to speak for themselves

August 3, 2016 by Think! Staff Leave a Comment

Letting go of brand control: Why the Swedish Tourist Association empowers residents to speak for themselves

Destinations are beginning to realize that there can be no destination branding without residents and that improved collaboration with their community is one of today’s key challenges. If you could harness the stories your locals are telling about your destination and its brand, what would that look like? Destination marketers and members of the Swedish […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Checking In, Destination Leadership Tagged With: brand, community and collaboration 2016, forum, leading thinkers, magnus ling, sweden, swedish tourist association

For Cape Breton Island, becoming a “true tourism destination” means forming strategic partnerships

July 28, 2016 by Think! Staff Leave a Comment

For Cape Breton Island, becoming a “true tourism destination” means forming strategic partnerships

Destination Cape Breton Association (DCBA) may look back on 2016 as a banner year. Visitation is increasing, new developments are in place, and the surprising “Trump Bump” campaign has drawn international (and particularly U.S.) interest to Cape Breton Island, located in Nova Scotia, Canada. Thanks to the unprecedented attention, the organization is receiving more inquiries […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Checking In, Destination Leadership Tagged With: destination cape breton association, development, mary tulle, partnerships, trump

The tourism “Trump Bump”: How a Canadian destination acted fast on a controversial opportunity

July 18, 2016 by Think! Staff Leave a Comment

The tourism “Trump Bump”: How a Canadian destination acted fast on a controversial opportunity

What do you do when the international spotlight suddenly shines on your destination? Carpe diem – seize the day, as Destination Cape Breton Association (DCBA) will tell you. Located on the Atlantic coast of Nova Scotia, Canada, Cape Breton Island continues to reap the rewards of an unorthodox campaign that began by encouraging U.S. residents […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Checking In, Innovation & Trends Tagged With: cape breton island, destination cape breton association, donald trump, mary tulle, nova scotia, obama, trump bump

Customer service wins: How Alaska Airlines chased an eclipse

July 7, 2016 by Mikala Folb Leave a Comment

Customer service wins: How Alaska Airlines chased an eclipse

There’s a community for almost everything, including eclipse chasers. And members of niche communities love to travel for their passions. So what do you do if you’re an airline, scheduled to traverse the “path of totality” (basically the best international seats for eclipse-watching) and a bunch of astronomers approach you to see if there’s anything […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Innovation & Trends, Re-fuel Tagged With: alaska airlines, anchorage, customer service, eclipse, honolulu, icelandair, niche

Use Place DNA™ to define your destination’s core identity

June 21, 2016 by Frank Cuypers Leave a Comment

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 […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, DMO Value Proposition, Long Haul, Topic: Place DNA Tagged With: charleroi, cleveland, DNA, gattaca, place dna, pretpark nederland, singapore, the netherlands, yubari, zutphen

How Destination Cleveland reimagined community and collaboration

June 20, 2016 by Think! Staff Leave a Comment

How Destination Cleveland reimagined community and collaboration

Battling negative perceptions – among visitors and locals alike – has never been easy for any destination. And when those negative perceptions result in low visitation, how is a destination meant to change minds? For the city of Cleveland, it meant standing up, squaring its shoulders and facing its detractors head on. By encouraging, facilitating […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Checking In, Destination Development Tagged With: cleveland, collaboration and community, community and collaboration 2016, david gilbert, leading thinkers

Destination Cleveland: Shifting perceptions and mobilizing locals

June 8, 2016 by Mikala Folb Leave a Comment

Destination Cleveland: Shifting perceptions and mobilizing locals

How does a destination battle negative perceptions? Get creative and embrace your DNA. “We’re not Paris, we’re not New York, we certainly aren’t Amsterdam,” said Corinne Allie, Senior Interactive Media Manager at Destination Cleveland in talk during Destination Think!’s Social Media Tourism Symposium conference in Amsterdam. Instead of fighting against what people were saying, her team […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Consumer Engagement, DMO Value Proposition, Passport Tagged With: #thisisCLE, brand, cleveland, community and collaboration, corinne allie, grassroots, perception, SoMeT, visitor expectations

Why destination marketers need to understand Place DNA™

May 30, 2016 by Frank Cuypers Leave a Comment

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 […]

Filed Under: Brand and Identity, Day Trip, DMO Value Proposition, Topic: Place DNA

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