After a year and a half?s worth of planning and $500,000 worth of investment, the Baltimore Area Convention and Visitors Association Wednesday unveiled its new branding and advertising campaign. Tagged “Get in on it,” the campaign?s main goal is to dispel the disparity between potential visitors? preconceived notions of what they?ll experience and the actual experience they?ll have when visiting the city.
” ?Get in on it? is a $500,000 investment toward the future,” said Ronnie Burt, the association?s interim president. “To grow our market share, we must invest in our future.”
To come up with its new brand messaging, BACVA hired Longwoods International, a tourism research firm and Landor Associates, which has developed branding for FedEx, BP and the cities of Hong Kong, Cincinnati and Madrid.
Those companies, in conjunction with BACVA, conducted 18 months of research and planning that included in-depth interviews with tourism stockholders in Baltimore, distribution of 1,000 surveys to BACVA members and local tourism stockholders, mail surveys to 1,000 meeting planners and leisure travelers nationally and two rounds of focus group testing among out-of-state travelers.
“Research shows that people who have not been to Baltimore don?t know what to expect,” Burt added.
Burt said the branding initiative is coming at an important time for the city, which in 2005 saw 12 million visitors, marking a seven-year high. Visitors that year spent almost $3 billion, according to D.K. Shifflet & Associates, which tracks the tourism industry.
According to Dr. Gary Vikan, chair of the brand repositioning task force, the branding campaign was developed using four criteria: People have to care about it; it has to be different; it has to be sustainable; and it has to be credible.
Fromthose criteria, the brand was developed focusing on Baltimore?s greatest assets ? its waterfront and the ease of exploring the city.
“We have everything every city has,” Burt said. “But the ease of exploring and the water is where we differentiate ourselves.”
Margot Amelia, vice president of marketing for BACVA, said the new logo, created by Landor, is suggestive of a city on the water while the compactness of the logo suggests a plethora of activities and attractions that are easily accessible. The tagline, she said, creates a “buzz factor.”
Aside from the new branding materials, BACVA?s local advertising agency, Carton Donofrio Partners, has designed television and radio ads featuring the same tagline and brand messaging. BACVA has allocated $700,000 for the month of June to launch the ads in Washington and Philadelphia, generating about 17 million impressions. Other components include online marketing and print media that will run in the Baltimore market to rally residents to become ambassadors for the city.
Branding Baltimore
Longwoods International developed the ?Get in on it? campaign after 18 months of research and planning.
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