Destination branding
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| Gary Joyce offers a strategic lever for Ireland's tourism growth |
Destination branding has become the flavour of the season and nowadays
every country, region and even city and county feels naked without its
own destination brand. Like all such flavours it is in danger of
promising more than it can deliver.
A brand helps to personalise the connection between
an audience and a branded object, so they relate to each other much as
two real people would. A personal relationship involves emotions and is
based above all on experiences, even if some of those experiences are
imagined or merely suggested to the target audience.
A personal relationship is founded firmly on expectations. We know, or
we think we know, what to expect from the people close to us and we
tend to set our expectations high. Once we have a positive relationship
we trust and remain loyal to that person. Indeed, we at times go
further and act as advocates for him or her.
Ditto branding. Branding is one of the ways we sort out the myriad
offerings the modern world is throwing at us. We pick a brand and
develop a relationship with it. So the small London restaurant can
benefit from associating itself with the mighty London brand. The tiny
B&B guesthouse in the remote vastnesses of Connemara can benefit
from associating itself with the Ireland tourism brand.
Some years ago, Spain’s tourist office decided to try and control
the perceptions of Spain held by the target audiences. It set out
deliberately to reframe those perceptions to its benefit. As a result,
Spain is no longer associated just with negatives like commodity
tourism, Franco and the Spanish Civil War. It is a country of Rioja
wine Pedro Almodovar movies, Miro’s art and Antoni Gaudi’s
architecture.
But creating a successful destination brand is not easy. From my own
experience in creating and rehabilitating brands in a host of areas,
including tourism, there are at least eight basic guidelines which
should be followed. Firstly…
BRAND=REALITY
The positioning created should be grounded in the real world, that is
the real world as the destination is currently perceived by the target
audiences and the real world as the destination is perceived by those
who actually live there.
Ireland is not a sunshine destination. But that is not to say that
Ireland cannot be made very attractive to holiday visitors.
RESEARCH PERCEPTIONS
The most important starting-point is what people in the target audience
think about you now. They will probably not know much about you and
they may know what they know about you in ways you would not
necessarily choose yourself .
A decade or so ago, when the Ireland tourism brand was created (for the
record, I was not involved), there was wide consultation, including
talks with politicians, artists and people from around the world.
Interesting things emerged.
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CRAIC SEEKERSIreland as personified in press ads in the UK. The ads stressed 'The island of memories' where music, poetry and food fests abound. |
Overwhelmingly, people saw the island of Ireland as having a particular
physical characteristic, a particular culture and a particular kind of
people. What emerged was a detailed picture of a potentially attractive
holiday destination open to marketing.
Ireland’s brand personality should be warm, witty, friendly, natural and inspiring.
The process began to be articulated in brand terms and communicated
creatively to address certain perception gaps that people had about
Ireland.
| PERCEPTION GAPS | |
| Perceived | Desirable |
| Macho | Active |
| Not for families | Friendly |
| No activities | Cultural |
| Unsophisticated | Personal |
| Summer only | Memorable |
The positioning you choose also has to be acceptable and credible
within the destination itself. So to the project’s third guideline.
REAL EXPECTATIONS
People in the destination need to know what visitors will expect of
them and they must be comfortable with those expectations. Again, if
you project yourself as a country of culture, it will be of no use if
when visitors come to you they find it difficult to experience the
culture experience themselves.
ALIGN BRANDING
It has been critical for Ireland to position itself attractively for
foreign direct investment. The people who promoted Irish industrial
development in the US frequently complained about the picture of
Ireland then projected by the Irish Tourist Board- Bord Failte of a
‘sleepy, traditional country, where time stood still’.
Resolving potential conflicts like this are an essential part of
creating a successful destination brand. The same kind of harmony is
needed if you create sub-brands within the tourism area. For instance,
we in Genesis have been working on creating a brand identity in the
field of business tourism.
We realised that what we came up with must sit well with the
existing positioning and should create synergies between the two. The
same procedure as the main brand was adopted, but with research
conducted from the perspective of business tourism.
Some segments of the market were identified where we had no hope of
competing, any more than we could compete with the sunshine resorts of
the Mediterranean. But there remained other segments of the overall
business market where there was potential to develop a competitive
positioning and that became the focus.
Ireland’s well-recognised strengths were outlined for their
relevance in a business context and a credible positioning was created
with market differentiation.
AGGRESSIVE ACTION
The new positioning must be aggressively marketed externally and internally.
Marketing a destination brand involves strategic advertising rather
than tactical advertising. Strategic advertising tends to be low on
product and high on values. It sells the sizzle rather than the sausage.
ALLOW FOR CHANGE
Your branding must allow for change, both in perception and reality.
The positioning must be sufficiently flexible that it can adapt
effortlessly to changing circumstances.
The Ireland of 1996, when the national tourism brand was being
developed, is not the Ireland of today. But not only have people's
perceptions of Ireland changed.
The country itself has altered hugely. It is now fast-moving and driven
by confidence and success. In step with this, the presentation of our
destination has adapted. Today, far less emphasis is placed on “pace”
than was the case originally.
In our current projection of Ireland, we take advantage of the new
‘buzz’ that makes the country so exciting. Most of the fundamentals
selected as the elements of our positioning back in 1996 still work for
us today – even in a totally changed Ireland and even in a world and a
tourism market that have changed as well.
 About Michael Cullen 
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