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Downtown Grand Rapids Branding Campaign


GR_Urbanist

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I've never referred to my hometown as being a "best-kept secret", nor have I ever

heard anyone who is from here use that phrase. I have heard it used over many

years by people who move here and wonder why they didn't know much about GR

before that. The statement was made as a joke, not as a wow.

It seems that this branding is meant to showcase the way the downtown area is now

and what it has to offer those who live here, those who are visiting here, and to entice

those who book conventions to come here. We don't want to be a secret...or to be

represented as having been a secret - that is a negative and building on that negative

is very difficult to express creatively funny or clever. Clearly, here, it just doesn't work.

Yesterday we were visited by a service provider from the Pointes. In a call today, he said that "you have it MADE over there; it's a wonderful place." I bragged on how I was born and raised in Oakland County and made my escape to the 616 a couple of years ago. He mentioned how he's lived in Florida, other warm climates, made it sound like he'd love to live here.

Why would we keep this a secret?

This reminds me of a print ad depicting a car with its back end on a copier. Huh????

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Maybe this tagline "Keep it a secret" belies the real feelings of some in the downtown community that they really don't want it to change that much. Remember that poll in the Business Journal that asked something about "Do you want downtown to get bigger?, etc." and how many people voted to have it stay the same or grow "a little". I think some people would really like to "keep it a well kept secret". I'd like someone to explain why? Explain please for us dumbasses? Is it because you might lose your precious parking spot to some "outsider" from the BIG CITY! Oh the horror!!! :rofl:

Sorry PR15, glad to have you here, but you only get one chance to make a good first impression. And this campaign fell flat on its face when it walked in the boardroom. H-M, you're fired!

Hopefully no one will notice the banners and logos and we add this to Mackey's World debacles. Hopefully there aren't too many more of them.

OK, maybe I'm being a little too harsh.

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Maybe this tagline "Keep it a secret" belies the real feelings of some in the downtown community that they really don't want it to change that much. Remember that poll in the Business Journal that asked something about "Do you want downtown to get bigger?, etc." and how many people voted to have it stay the same or grow "a little". I think some people would really like to "keep it a well kept secret". I'd like someone to explain why? Explain please for us dumbasses? Is it because you might lose your precious parking spot to some "outsider" from the BIG CITY! Oh the horror!!! :rofl:

Sorry PR15, glad to have you here, but you only get one chance to make a good first impression. And this campaign fell flat on its face when it walked in the boardroom. H-M, you're fired!

Hopefully no one will notice the banners and logos and we add this to Mackey's World debacles. Hopefully there aren't too many more of them.

OK, maybe I'm being a little too harsh.

Nicely put GRDadof3

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I agree with PR-15 and that dude's girlfriend. It's great. Because it requires everyone who sees and reads it to ask "Why?"

"Keep it a secret."

"Why?"

"Because it's so awesome."

"What's so flippin' awesome about it?"

"There's this great restaurant down there and ....."

You pique curiosity with that statement and suddenly you have people engaged in a conversation about the awesomeness of downtown Grand Rapids. Even if it's a sarcastic "why," you're now open a door to change someone's perception.

Engagement increases the likelihood of commitment and the logo/slogan starts the conversation.

Okay, now we're getting somewhere! Glad someone is feeling it! :yahoo:

Remember, it's layered. We're only getting the first layer.

PS-the way I understand it, unless you're a business owner in the Downtown Improvement District, your taxes didn't pay for the brand. The DID members voluntarily tax themselves for marketing and beautification projects within the district. Hope that makes some of you who hate it feel a bit better...at least a little.

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PS-the way I understand it, unless you're a business owner in the Downtown Improvement District, your taxes didn't pay for the brand. The DID members voluntarily tax themselves for marketing and beautification projects within the district. Hope that makes some of you who hate it feel a bit better...at least a little.

That is the way I read it too, who threw out the idea that city taxes paid for this?

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The DID members voluntarily tax themselves for marketing and beautification projects within the district. Hope that makes some of you who hate it feel a bit better...at least a little.

No, it wasn't a tax, exactly. It's a cost that is passed along to everyone in the price of goods and services sold downtown. Cost-shifting, yes. A tax, no.

Again, if it pays off, great. If not, the Alliance should have bought more of those bad-ass street sweepers instead.

If the Alliance and HM want to make people feel "a little better" how about committing to 6-month and 1-year analyses of the program?

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One of the basic goals of a PR campaign is to get people talking about something, long before you actually spend money placing the ads, buying air time or papering billboards. I guess we can all say they've been successful with THAT part of it so far!

Someone once said there's no such thang as bad PR -- as long as they're talking about you. I'm not sure I agree with THAT, but we are definitely talking about this campaign -- for better or worse.

It would be nice to see some of the marketing dollars spent right here in West Michigan -- benefitting those who work and live here, but I fear much of it will be spent in Detroit and Indiana trying to get folks to drive here and then not tell anyone about it. :)

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It would be nice to see some of the marketing dollars spent right here in West Michigan -- benefitting those who work and live here, but I fear much of it will be spent in Detroit and Indiana trying to get folks to drive here and then not tell anyone about it. :)

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If you can draw someone who only comes to downtown GR 1-3 times a year to come down 10 times, it will have a very dramatic effect cumulitively on the dt economy.

Sounds good. But enough touting. Let's get a commitment to measure and report back on that dramatic effect.

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As I understand it, the primary audience (and money spent) for the campaign is targeted at people who live within 5-40 minutes of dowtown...not out-of-staters or the metro-Detroit area. Basically, the burbs and outlying communities out to the lakeshore.

That's good to hear. I guess the "Michigan's West Coast" campaign already is doing the work of marketing the region to out-of-staters and east-siders.

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No, it wasn't a tax, exactly. It's a cost that is passed along to everyone in the price of goods and services sold downtown. Cost-shifting, yes. A tax, no.

Well, I suppose technically that is true of every thing you buy, isn't it? We all pay for the gas that gets the eggs to market. But I doubt any DID retailer thinks about marking up your hamburger a specific percentage to cover their self-imposed DID assessment dollars.

My point was that the money did not come out of your paycheck in the form of a direct payroll deduction to the city or your residential property taxes.

Again, if it pays off, great. If not, the Alliance should have bought more of those bad-ass street sweepers instead.

I fully agree with you. Those sweepers are pretty dang sweet...

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Acountability, shmountability...Who wants to go buy some "Angry Olive Eyeball" pens!! :yahoo:

Sign me up for a "gross"...

(sorry)

Hey, PR15 -- I will happily pay 50 cents more for my four friends coffee or $10 more for my VanHoek's wing tips if it will generate an actual report on the impact of the eyeball...how about it?

(oh, and by someone other than HM or Grand FLACKtion -- let's get someone objective)

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Hey, PR15 -- I will happily pay 50 cents more for my four friends coffee or $10 more for my VanHoek's wing tips if it will generate an actual report on the impact of the eyeball...how about it?

(oh, and by someone other than HM or Grand FLACKtion -- let's get someone objective)

Sure, I think that is a fantastic idea. What type of economic data could they use as a baseline? I don't really know how one would accurately measure the specific impact in the way you're suggesting. I'm clearly not an economist.

I doubt a "survey" or feedback form by DID businesses would be all that useful or very accurate for that matter.

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Sure, I think that is a fantastic idea. What type of economic data could they use as a baseline? I don't really know how one would accurately measure the specific impact in the way you're suggesting. I'm clearly not an economist.

I doubt a "survey" or feedback form by DID businesses would be all that useful or very accurate for that matter.

I certainly hope the Downtown authority is doing some kind of tracking survey to judge the effctiveness of this campaign... not that the numbers are really going to tell them anything special. Every survey I've ever put together, I've wanted the last question to say, "Now that we've totally wasted your time and asked all the wrong questions, please tell us what you really think."

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I guess the real true barometer will be the scenes of people walking the streets entering local business and walking out with bags full of goodies. Or the family that just saw a great advertisement for downtown and decided to park the car at the ramp get out and walk around.

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