9 July 2009

By Catherine Proulx, Managing Director, Twist Marketing

Municipal development strategy can be a tough needle to thread, but it's a task made easier with the sharpened focus provided through community brand-building.

Consider, first, the method by which you want to tailor both social and economic development strategy in your community. Sure, you can just sit down and arbitrarily cut a plan from whole cloth, but there's a risk you'll end up less with a strategy than a wish list. Like the Emperor's new clothes, it may not be tied closely enough to reality to offer meaningful coverage of your community's future goals.

A more common approach is to stitch together everyone's version of reality: cobbling together the myriad government-generated documents on planning and development with the perspectives of business associations, chambers of commerce, broader regional directions and resident opinions to create a patchwork of development intent.

The difficulty with such an approach is that all those seams make for a weak overall fabric—one that doesn't hold up well under stress. The end result is cluttered, lacking a clear, defined focal point. It forces resources to be allocated to stitching the various goals together, rather than forwarding a common, collective vision.

Ultimately, what will serve you best is a strategic tapestry that addresses both the inherent social beauty and the more tangible material goals of your community, which is where brand-building comes into play. Brand becomes the loom that weaves together the threads of pragmatism, potential and purpose, creating a productive, impactful banner behind which the entire community can rally.

To fully understand the concept, forget any notions of logo and letterhead. That's just the embroidery that enhances the final fabric of any development strategy.

What powerful brand-building does is gather pre-existing threads of community, like demographics, geography and resource-base, and snips away loose ends such as unrealistic goals and out-of-reach target markets.

Does this mean some outside marketing firm comes in and dictates your development strategy?

Of course not.

The threads that a successful brand employs are already in place, right now, in your community, regardless how developed your long-term development planning may be. Residents, council members and bureaucrats alike already have an intuitive sense of, and passion for, their municipality's strengths, weaknesses and areas of opportunity. The branding process, through stakeholder workshops, polls and research, should instead bring a murky vision into clear relief; tapping into a well-spring of local knowledge, sentiment and desire.

The merit of an outside marketing firm in the process is a clearer big-picture perspective: familiarity can breed a lack of focus that's detrimental to strategic marketing.

Take one resident's perception of his hometown, which may be blurred by his favourite memory of childhood fishing trips. That doesn't make nifty fishing holes the municipality's greatest strength, despite his conviction to the contrary. Conversely, a major tourist draw may well be the stunning waterfall on the outskirts of town that the locals just don't notice anymore.

Who better to help distinguish what will appeal most to people outside the community than...well, an outsider?

The Twist: Every community, no matter how big or how small, has strengths and weaknesses. But the strength that attracted one resident to live in the community may be seen as a weakness by another. Or others may not even be aware of it. When it comes to community branding, looking at things with a fresh, objective eye is essential.

For more marketing articles, please visit www.twistmarketing.com/resources