Branding Strategy Insider

Rebuilding Brand America

Just as businesses rely on their brand recognition and public perception to help improve commercial success, a country’s reputation and global image is a reflection of the strength of its “brand.” 

In recent years, while other countries brands have drastically improved, America’s brand has declined. A recent study shows America’s brand index as ranking 7th among all other major, developed nations. In order to improve its global brand recognition, what America needs is an objective audit of “brand America” and new focus on reestablishing the authenticity of the American Promise.

Following the widely accepted principles of what makes a brand strong, brand America must adhere to the same foundational pillars: being relevant and meaningful to a strategic target audience; being competitive and as attractive a solution to meeting the need as alternative options; and being authentic while delivering the expectation set.

A Brand Must be Relevant
The relevancy of brand America is without question. The promise of brand America speaks loudly to the human desire for exerting some control over personal destiny. 

Since its inception, the brand America promise has been the opportunity for the pursuit of life, liberty and happiness. Brand America has come to represent a location where anybody has the chance to self-manage his or her destiny, and in the process be rewarded for both hard work and the courage to take smart risks. There are countless examples of entrepreneurs achieving remarkable success based on ingenuity, passion and effort.

“Rags to riches” is the cliché most commonly used to describe the success of Americans, and has served to inspire people around the world to change their destiny. It promises life in America will provide the opportunity needed to achieve their full personal potential.

The Case For Place Branding

In my current role, I am often asked why I believe place branding is a right strategy for accelerating the economic growth of a location.

Global competition for capital investment in increasing, driven in part by companies deciding to increase their capability and capacity to service emerging markets in Asia. This puts pressure on the amount of practically available capital for investing in developed markets. Additionally, advances in telecommunications are making it possible for companies to service developed markets from virtually any location that can provide a high-speed internet connection. Limited dollars and increased choice are the classic conditions that demand effective place branding to attract capital investment and drive accelerated economic growth.

Place branding is a strategy being used by an increasing number of locations around the world to effectively compete for an increased share of foreign direct investment dollars and capital expansion of resident companies. However, too often place branding initiatives are little more than sales campaigns with limited sustainable impact.

Branding Small Municipalities: Visitor Attraction

What does it take to get visitors to stop in your town? Better yet, what does it take to get them to make your town a destination?

As with all other brands, your town must deliver each of the following to become a strong brand:

•    Awareness
•    Relevant differentiation
•    Value
•    Convenience
•    Emotional connection

Let’s start with relevant differentiation. That is the most important driver of strong brands. Why should someone stop in your town or, better yet, plan a trip to your town? What makes your town unique or more compelling than others?

To determine relevant differentiation, you must first identify your municipality’s assets. Is it near a lake, a mountain or a cave? Does it have a large waterfall? Is there a whitewater river nearby? Is the weather particularly nice at certain times of year (or year-round)? Does it have a well-known golf course? Does it have a unique museum? Does it have an interesting history? Did a famous person grow up or live there? Does it have unusual architecture? Does it have a rich cultural life? Is it the home of an annual fair? Does it have an annual art, music or film festival? Does it have an annual sporting event? Does it have interesting ethnic neighborhoods?

Next you must determine what types of people are most likely to be attracted by your municipality’s assets.

Place Branding for Small Municipalities

Place Branding is a regular topic here on Branding Strategy Insider. We have covered the process as well as other angles of the discipline. Admittedly, the focus of our blog posts and our consulting work has been on large municipalities. A recent inquiry from a small town in South Dakota (USA) inspired us to design an approach specifically for smaller municipalities with limited resources.

We are now offering an inexpensive and proven turn-key approach to successfully branding small and medium sized municipalities to residents, businesses and tourists. The output is a brand promise that is unique, compelling and believable for your municipality and a tagline that articulates that promise.

The process includes the following steps:

•    INFORMATION REVIEW: Information gathering with key stakeholders including mayor, city manager, visitors and convention bureau, economic development agency, business improvement districts, business owners and cultural institution leaders
o    Includes review of research, websites and marketing documents/presentations
o    Focuses on identification of strengths/assets
•    DEVELOPING BRAND PROMISE OPTIONS: Development of up to 25 brand promise options based upon strengths/assets
•    TESTING BRAND PROMISE OPTIONS: Testing of brand promise options with the most important target audiences (residents, businesses, tourists) through an online survey
o    Evaluation criteria include relative appeal, uniqueness and believability for your municipality
•    SELECTING BRAND PROMISE: Recommended brand promise/positioning

Place Branding Q & A

Today we are sharing some of the questions and answers from recent interviews regarding the place branding process. We hope our insight helps you in your place branding endeavors.

*How is branding a city different from branding a product?

In some respects, branding places is no different than branding anything else. Finding the most powerful and unique image for the place (“unique value proposition” or “brand position”) is the most important activity. After that, building awareness is next most important. Both of these activities assume that the requisite research has been done with the most advantageous and receptive target audiences.

Beyond the basics, branding places becomes a more interesting and complex activity than branding a typical product or organization. The target audiences are myriad and disparate, including at least the following:

•    Residents and potential residents
•    Businesses and potential businesses
•    Tourists/visitors
•    Meeting and an event planners (including convention planners and major sporting event organizers)

Each of these audiences has its own distinct issues and needs.

*What does a city – or place need to discover in the branding process?

Ultimately, a place must find those one or two things that will get the target audiences excited about living, visiting and conducting business in its geography. Those one or two things must be unique and compelling enough to cause those people to choose it over all of the other increasingly compelling options that residents, tourists, businesses and meeting planners have. And, most importantly, those one or two things need to be authentic and believable. Finding these one or two things is much easier said than done and requires rigorous research among the target audiences.
 

Powerful Place Branding

It is very important for a place to take inventory of its assets to determine which of those are unique and compelling to each of its target audiences. For instance, my city, Rochester, New York has identified the following as potential assets:

•    Large number of cultural amenities
o    Largest number of cultural workers per capita
o    Rich musical scene – Eastman School of Music, Hochstein School of Music and Dance, Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, Rochester International Jazz Festival, etc.
o    Numerous film festivals
o    (George Eastman House) International Museum of Photography and Film
o    (Strong) National Museum of Play with the National Toy Hall of Fame
o    Writers & Books delivers the biggest literary center program per capita
•    Abundant outdoor recreational opportunities
o    Close proximity to the Finger Lakes
o    Lake Ontario, Erie Canal, Gennesee River
o    Nearby skiing
•    Light traffic, short commutes
•    Affordable housing
•    Excellent school systems
•    Large concentration of colleges and universities
•    Concentration of optics, biotechnology, food and beverage science and fuel cell technology businesses
•    Largest number of utility patents issued per capita
•    Very high United Way giving per capita
•    Friendly people
•    Pleasant summers

The proper analysis is to evaluate each of the assets against the following criteria – unique, compelling, believable – with each of the target audiences. The place would then choose one or more of the assets as the foundation for its unique value proposition. Closely related assets could be clustered together under a broader heading or could be used as proof points for higher level assets.

In Rochester’s case, while its top-of-mind associations might be “snow” or “long winters” or “Kodak” today, it could be “small town feel, big city culture,” or “just perfect for families” tomorrow.

Most places stand for a small number things in peoples’ minds. This is their brand position. The objective of a branding exercise is to insure that the primary associations are unique and compelling, not neutral or negative.

The Anatomy of Place Branding

According the World Travel and Tourism Council (wttc.org), travel and tourism is “one of the world's largest industries, employing approximately 231 million people and generating over 10.4 per cent of world GDP.” When one considers that businesses, residents and event and meeting planners also choose one place over another, it is no wonder that cities, regions and countries are branding themselves in earnest.

This phenomenon has been labeled “place branding,” “geo-branding” and “destination marketing” among other labels. In some respects, branding places is no different than branding anything else. Finding the most powerful and unique image for the place (“unique value proposition” or “brand position”) is the most important activity. After that, building awareness is next most important. Both of these activities assume that the requisite research has been done with the most advantageous and receptive target audiences.

Beyond the basics, branding places becomes a more interesting and complex activity than branding a typical product or organization. The target audiences are myriad and disparate, including at least the following:

•    Residents and potential residents
•    Businesses and potential businesses
•    Tourists/visitors
•    Meeting and an event planners (including convention planners and major sporting event organizers)

Each of these audiences has its own distinct issues and needs.

Extreme Makeover: Brand America

In today’s hyper-competitive world, countries are becoming important brands in terms of tourism and business, and it doesn’t take too many trips out in the world to sense that Brand America is in trouble.

If you’re interested in the numbers, the Pew Research people have them all. The basic message: America’s image is in a dramatic decline just about everywhere. This is not a good thing in a world being driven by the global economy. Whether you’re Boeing, Apple Computer, General Electric or Ford Motor,  it’s not helpful when people dislike the country of origin. It gives your global competitors an emotional edge.

No one appreciates this more than Brand America’s sales force, namely the State Department.

Several years ago, I was asked by them to develop a marketing program to help diplomatic officers better sell America, its products and its efforts to the world community. Obviously, it’s something that is desperately needed. The only concept attached to the U.S. is a terrible one: “The world’s last superpower.” All this expression does is to portray us as the world’s bully. And some of the administration’s language and policies only re-enforced this perception. In China, for example, the media often refers to America as the global police.

Coming up with a better marketing concept was fairly simple. Go to the world community with a program that offered more benefits, not one with threats. The strategy was to have President George W. Bush say to the world that we are shifting from self-vision to a new world vision simply expressed as: “Helping the world to be a safer, freer and more prosperous place.” That’s what everyone wants, and we can help deliver those benefits. Here’s a simple, but wise, observation as to why this approach should work. It’s from The New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman as he wrote, “If you convey to people that you want them to succeed, they will take criticism. If you convey that you hold them in contempt, they won’t listen to you.”

Place Branding: Rochester, New York

I recently led the first phase of the effort to brand my hometown, Rochester, New York. I'd like to share my thoughts on this ongoing process.

Like it or not - we are branded. Whether intentionally managed or not, brands exist in the minds of people to whom they should matter. I most often hear the following associated with Rochester by people who don’t know the city: snow, Kodak, downsizing, economically struggling Upstate city, long winters. These are not the words or phrases most of us would want associated with Rochester at the top of people’s minds. Take snow for example. Snow is not so bad if you are Colorado or Utah. And, we don’t get nearly as much snow as Buffalo or Syracuse. And, it is great that Bristol Mountain is only a half hour away. But, there may be other associations that are more helpful.

In the online survey I conducted, the following most resonates with residents: “Small town feel, big city culture,” reflecting our plethora of museums, musical concerts, film festivals, etc. but also our (mostly) friendly residents, easy commutes, affordable housing, cozy neighborhoods, etc.

While we will likely never successfully compete with New York and Chicago and San Francisco, I believe we should be able to very successfully compete with Austin, TX, Portland, OR, Columbus, OH, etc.

From the survey, most residents would describe Rochester as being a culturally rich and progressive (but also traditional in some ways) middle sized city with numerous colleges and universities and a highly educated population. They would also say that the quality of life is high with short commutes, affordable housing, attractive neighborhoods and very good school systems (the city itself excepted). Finally, they like the almost unlimited opportunities for day and weekend trips and the close proximity of the Finger Lakes and other rural scenic beauty.

So what is the problem? Very high taxes, which drive jobs away, which in turn drive people away. People like it here. They just can’t find the jobs for which their educations prepared them. Rochester isn’t often in the consideration set when it comes to manufacturing firm relocations. It’s not that we don’t have a skilled workforce or the right colleges and universities feeding the workforce. We do. However, our tax rates, utility costs and freight rates are so high that we aren’t often even in the consideration set.

BrandingWire: Estes Park

This month the BrandingWire Team has set its sights on Place Branding.

The resort town of Estes Park, Colorado is our focus.

Estes Park may be new to you – it was to me. This brief will give you a full sense of Estes Park. As is the spirit of BrandingWire, each month members share their perspectives on how to help strengthen the chosen brand.

Place Brands
It’s clear that the strongest place brands are positioned to be relevant, unique and compelling and are built by community leaders, stakeholders, and organizations that promote the competitive advantage by speaking with a unified voice. Economic Development Organizations, Convention and Visitor Bureaus, Chambers of Commerce, and Government bodies are all in synch with each other when communicating the brand promise.

The community delivers on the promise because it's who they really are.

The Estes Park Brand
As I’ve stepped closer to Estes Park I like what I see. It seems like an inviting place with much potential. Like every brand, Estes Park has its strengths and weaknesses. Based on the brief I propose these ideas: