Maxx Marketing News

Branding Experts Speak Out

Here are some thoughts from a variety of people who have had extensive experience in
branding places and travel products. Their views provide valuable insights for creating
and managing sustainable brands for cities, regions, and countries.

“Tomorrow’s tourism marketing environment will be one defined by ever-increasing
competition, greater product parity and consumer choice in which intangibles such as
brand values, experiences, emotional benefits and celebrity will be the key
differentiating factors.”
Morgan & Pritchard - ‘Destination Branding’

“Successful destination brands are those that are able to clearly differentiate
themselves and simplify choices for customers. Experience has shown us that
fundamental to developing a winning brand is recognizing that it is much more than a
new logo, new graphic design, or “a fresh coat of paint”. And a destination’s brand is not
an advertising theme or a tagline. A destination brand is the totality of perceptions that
a customer holds about the experiences associated with a place. Effective management
of these perceptions and experiences can secure enduring value for the destination, its
partners, and customers.

This means that the brand is built at every point of contact between customers and
the location. Each of these points before, during and after the visit has a vital role in
building and delivering the experience embodied in the brand. The logo and tagline
serve as valuable reminders for the values inherent in the brand. Unless a destination
brand is adopted, supported and given “life” by stakeholders and partners, it will amount
to nothing more than a mark on a piece of paper. You must set out from the start to build
a “living” brand and create the strategies, to deliver a memorable brand experience at
every critical point of contact with your customers.”
Bill Baker - Total Destination Management

“Many politicians and statesmen – like many lay people – don’t understand what is
meant by branding, and believe that it’s simply a matter of designing a new logo and
possibly a slogan to go underneath it. And this is not helped by communications
agencies who pander to this misconception by simply selling them logos and slogans
(…. and not a strategic solution). ”
Simon Anholt - “Brand New Justice”

“Place images represent a simplification of a large number of associations and pieces
of information connected with the place. They are a product of the mind trying to process
and prioritize huge amounts of data about a place.”
Prof. Phillip Kotler - Northwest University

“There is only one reason why people have ever bought from you in the past, and why
they will ever buy from you in the future, and that is because they want to change the
way they feel. Its that simple!…….. For a brand to take off and fly, it must first
deliberately and single-mindedly set about acquiring and owning a little piece of the
minds of millions of people.”
Geoff Ayling - WAM Advertising

“Coherence of communication is necessary because in the global world in which we
now live, every place has to compete with every other place for share of mind, share of
income, share of talent, share of voice. Unless a place can stand for something, it stands
little chance of being remembered for long enough to compete for any of this precious
attention. Most of us spend no more than a few seconds each year thinking about a
country on the other side of the world or a city at the other end of the country. So unless
a country or city always seems exactly like itself every time it crops up, there is little
chance that those few seconds of attention will ever add up to a preference for its
products, a desire to go and visit the place, an interest in its culture, or, if we were
prejudiced against the place in some way beforehand, a change of heart.”
Simon Anholt - “Brand New Justice”

“How can cities, regions and industry segments (e.g. economic development, tourism,
investment, etc), in a State create the needed identity for themselves, yet remain under
the larger brand for the State? The answer lies in the mechanics of what is called “brand
architecture”. Brand architecture is that which organizes and structures a brand
portfolio by specifying brand roles and the nature of relationships between them and
their markets. Well designed and executed, the architecture of a brand portfolio can
generate clarity, synergy, brand leverage and marketing efficiency…. so that everyone
understands how the various parts reinforce each other”
Marsha Lindsay - Lindsay, Stone and Briggs - “The Brand Called Wisconsin”

“A brand is a living entity - and it is enriched or undermined cumulatively over time, the
product of a thousand small gestures.”
Michael Eisner, - CEO, Disney

“Success means never letting the competition define you. Instead you have to define
yourself based on a point of view you care deeply about.”
Tom Chappell - Tom’s of Maine

“Your brand is not what you say you are …. your brand is what your customers think
you are. Each person’s experience with a product is as unique as a snowflake. Each of
us has a personal experience that is experienced by no other individual.”
Steve Yastrow - “Brand Harmony”

If your identity is going to convince anyone outside the area, it has to be believed by
the people living in it. It takes time to change perceptions. Research shows that oneoff
initiatives have very little impact on attitudes. The basic message needs to be
continually reinforced using different media in different contexts.
Mark Leonard - “Britain. Renewing Our Identity”

“All great brands are built on the bedrock of trust derived from customer’s
experiences sold under the brand name. Brands create customer value because they
reduce both the effort and the risk of buying things, and therefore give owners an
incentive to invest in quality and innovation.”
Prof. Patrick Barwise - London Business School

“(Our people) know what needs to be done and they do it. Our culture is our true
competitive advantage.”
Herb Kelleher, - South West Airlines

“Brand success is not determined by the advertising that is carried out to promote it, but
the overall experience of its delivery. We have to move the brand from being presented
as a trip, a vacation or a destination to becoming a wholly immersive, aspirational and
engaging experience.”
Ken Boundy - Executive Director
Australian Tourist Commission

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