Some hearsay:
More than twenty years ago, Madison's community leaders decided to build a theater in Madison to keep SDSU's Prairie Repertory Theatre from leaving town. When various members of Madison artistic class asked to be involved in the design of the theater, they were told by members of the business class on the building committee, "We don't need your kind around here."
Sound familiar, Chris?
In the latest laughable propaganda about the success of our failed Forward Madison economic development initiative, LAIC mouthpiece Alan Van Ormer asserts without evidence that Madison's recent economic development effort has "changed the way the community looks at economic development."
No it hasn't. Madison's "leaders" still ignore the arts in their economic development plans. Van Ormer's article mentions nothing about the role the arts can play in small-town economic development. The listed components of the next economic development initiative, Forward Madison II, include "retail, manufacturing, housing, workforce development, business retention, and business recruitment." The LAIC pastes retail at the front to tamp down the negative publicity they got this summer for ignoring Madison's retail decline, but the other items reflect exactly the same thinking as before. They also fail to address creative cultural development right under the LAIC's nose.
That's funny: if the LAIC really meant what it had Pat Prostrollo say about getting "more people... involved in the process" of economic development in Madison, they'd be listening to those of us in the community who have been recommending including the arts in our economic development efforts. They'd learn from successful cultural events around Madison as well as the examples of Brookings, Sioux Falls, Spearfish, New York Mills, and Perm, Russia.
But no. The LAIC hasn't changed the way Madison looks at economic development. Madison's leaders still turn a blind eye to research showing the value of creative culutral development for rural communities. Madison still doesn't think it needs our kind around here.
Bonus Aesthetic Failure: The latest LAIC propaganda features a bright, bold picture of the Madison sign the LAIC put up:
This sign epitomizes the LAIC ignorance of the value of art. It looks o.k. from the road, but take a close look, and you see how chintzy it is. We see the bare wood frame. The slogan looks tacked on, as if we wanted to make sure we could easily remove and replace it (one can only hope). And at the bottom right, whoever installed the sign lacked the design sense to place the utility box on the back of the beam.
John Green
...not part of Forward Madison or Forward Madison II or the article discussed here.
After reading your posts, why would anyone waste their time on Madison?
Michael, please don't fall into the LAIC "circle the wagons" mode of thinking. Any time they hear criticism, they get defensive and shoot the messenger. I write these critiques specifically to urge the LAIC to drop its failed policies, broaden its thinking, and adopt comprehensive economic development policies that would get people to spend their time and money in Madison. Instead, they dress up failure as success and refuse to change. It's that blindness, not the fact that I mention it, that would keep people from investing in Madison.
If they choose not to take your advice, then what?
It all depends on the vision that you portray. Is it money or people who make things happen? We forget the common person in our ambition to focus on only growth that may only benefit the few.
Since I saw the sign being built and know the people who built it, I thought I should mention that the letters, and the frame they are attached to, for that Madison sign are all metal. I can't say anything about how it was installed. I didn't take part in it and didn't see it happen, but I know that sign is not light and probably wouldn't have been installed on wooden supports. Plus it was built in Madison.
Two older people moved to Madison and thought there would be more arts and culture since this is a college town. With that and a couple other issues (unexpected crime being one) they wanted to move after being here two years. They find the grocery store acceptable.
Regarding the sign, it looks pretty darn good. Impressive rock work.
"Discover the unexpected."
As opposed to what?
Brand promises like that drive me nuts.
They could mean anything, and not necessarily something good.
Rapid City's is just as bad: "Real. America. Up close."
Pffft.
Name a town in the USA that doesn't fill that bill once you come to town.
Marketing companies get paid a lot of money to come up with those things. Usually the town hires some big consulting company from out of town to write that stuff. People who don't know anything about the town and never will.
And you can always tell, because if they hire a bad one, you end up with something like "Discover the unexpected."
Because that's all the guy who wrote the slogan will ever know about Madison.
That, and how easy it was to sell Madison a phrase that doesn't really mean anything, even to him.
Bill, believe it or not, locals wrote that slogan.
Oh no. That's even sadder.
Can you imagine saying that about yourself, Cory?
"Hey Bill, come on over and visit me at my house. We're not at all who you think we might be."
People forget when they're marketing that what they're really trying to do is start a relationship. Best thing to do is to highlight a specific, unique positive attribute that you, and only you, can promise and deliver.
Not having been to Madison ever, I don't have any expectations at all.
Telling me I'll experience something unexpected there doesn't mean anything at all to me, because I don't expect anything. Any experience I have there, good or bad would be "unexpected."
Now, if instead they said "Madison. Magic. Mysterious." I might be a little intrigued. But I would "expect" them to prove it, starting with their website. Reel me in, baby.
Bottom line, I'm glad they didn't spend a lot of money on their slogan. I hope they don't have much emotional investment in it either. I'm sure they can do a whole lot better.
Hope these comments help.
just thinking out loud: http://dcist.com/2011/10/ice_ice_baby_-_columbia_room_hosts.php#photo-1
When we came to Madison some 30 years ago, downtown had lots of stores owned by individuals. Julie Gross does have a point - small business owners will grow Madison. An example is walking down mainstreet in Brookings...lots of small business owners working to make a living. My question is why isn't the Chamber of Commerce active in the mission to fill empty store fronts?
There are no businesses downtown because they have no traffic.
Last December I was downtown on a Saturday morning and the store clerk said I was the first one to walk in the door and that was after 11 in the morning. Stan's was busy, but the rest of Egan was empty.
Thanks, Bill. Your comments would help... if the LAIC and the Chamber were inclined to listen. Sadly, Madison appears to respond to constructive criticism rather defensively. We lack people in positions of power who are willing to disagree, contradict, or criticize. We thus end up not just enacting bad ideas, but praising them when they fail.
In 2005, we did pay Paulsen Marketing $2500 to host focus groups and create a new slogan. Paulsen offered three options: “The Great Little City Between the Lakes,†“Two Lakes. One Great Town,†and “Madison. Your New Favorite Place.†The city commission balked at those and waited for our local marketers to compose our current positioning line.
On filling those storefronts: remember that the LAIC announced with great fanfare its "Main Street and More" program in 2008. Whatever that initiative was, it held no public meetings, sought no public participation, and produced no results. The LAIC canned that program within months of its inception. Why did they can it? No one knows. The LAIC has never said. It has never shared with us the knowledge gained from that apparent failure that might help us form a better program.
John: "Safe and Acceptable" might be more accurate than our current slogan. I'm not sure it stirs my soul.
Michael, if they choose not to take my advice, or Ashley's, or anyone else's other than the chosen elites, then we will quite likely be left asking, like Churchill, what we are fighting for. Face facts: Forward Madison clearly didn't work. We need to be honest about that failure. We need to openly assess what caused that failure. The Van Ormer article denies reality. Denying reality is usually a recipe for continued failure.
Tact - Acute sensitivity to what is proper and appropriate in dealing with others, including the ability to speak or act without offending.
Michael, the city leaders want you to mistake "tact" for an unhealthy conformity and silence. Forward Madison just wasted $2.3 million, including $500,000 of city taxpayer money. No one can show tangible results from that expenditure. If you waste $2.3 million of my money, I will not respond with tact. I will respond with a firm boot to your butt (likely figurative, but no guarantees).
Madison has a hypersensitivity to criticism. For its own good, Madison needs to get over it, face its problems, call failure failure, and work toward real solutions.
Michael, Madison could find a way to tactfully explain to us what went wrong and what we can do better next time. The city isn't choosing tact. It's choosing fantasy.
We spend money on advertising each year and find it almost impossible to track the results. One thing I learned in 35 years of business is that those who advertise and promote continue to grow when others fail. If nothing else, perhaps Forward Madison simply does that. If we haven't grown (which we haven't for over 60 years), maybe we also haven't declined as much as we could have without the extra local efforts?
I fully agree that Madison's small business owners will drive the growth and LAIC, the City of Madison and perhaps the State Economic Development officials should work together to help local businesses borrow low-interest money for new roofing, windows and tuckpointing as a method to rejuvinate main street.
Rod, if you can't track the results, then you're not advertising with the right people. We spent $2.3 million, advertised, and didn't grow. We are entitled to much more substantive answers than fantasies about alternative universes in which we declined much more. Prove it. Show me numbers. The LAIC continues to refuse to provide numbers. It provided numbers up front to make the sale, but it refuses to provide numbers now to objectively evaluate its performance.
I agree with Rod that is difficult to measure the success of advertising...and this is my area of expertise. I went to school for it and I market our studio every day. Customers will come to you in the most unexpected ways. The small, consistent contacts you make each day can be far more valuable than one big advertising splash.
The right contact can turn your world upside down and send your business vertical.
I'm not involved with the LAIC. I know people that are and have donated their time, energy and money to attract more business to Madison. Why do you suggest that their is a giant conspiracy in the LAIC and business leaders to purposely waste money and keep Madison on a downward spiral?
Complete baloney.
This is the kind of conversation that gives advertisers and marketers a bad name. Let me set you straight.
Advertising should be purchased to achieve specific marketing and advertising objectives.
These objectives should be measurable and time specific.
Marketing problems introducing a cold audience to something new come in 5 "flavors:"
1.Awareness,
2.Interest,
3.Evaluation,
4.Trial, and
5. Adoption
Each of these becomes a marketing objective and should be stated as such in measurable, time-specific terms in your marketing plan.
Only three of the five can be completely addressed by advertising dollars. You need an advertising strategy for each of these. (1, 2, and 4)
If you are not doing the above, you are wasting your ad money.
Thus endeth the lecture. ;^)
Okay, one more clue. The problem with Madison's positioning statement is that it ASSUMES the town has an evaluation problem when in fact, it may not. In any case, bu repeating their positioning line over and over, they are actively spending advertising dollars to ASSURE that they do.
The Paulsen suggestions for a slogan were far superior to the one being used for precisely this reason.
There are ways to test these things before you use them.
They don't cost much.
Madison should have done it.
How about another gem of ill-advised marketing in Madison, 'Technically, We're Better'
I find the recent introduction of Dakota State's slogan to be smug and a negative, especially as they are part of a larger university system, and this campaign is seemingly targeted at their very partners in education.
My quick suggestion would have been to go with 'Technically Speaking', and try to connect that DSU students have the ability to communicate technology and connect beyond a keyboard from skills gained within the classroom and beyond, but I'm not a fan of the use of 'Technically' either, but in no way would I advocate 'We're Better', just leaves a bad taste.
And then there is that logo...
[CAH: you know, Chris, in general, I'm o.k. with a slogan that claims, "We're the best!" Isn't that what most ads try to do? I do agree, though, that within the context of one big happy Regental system, having our universities advertise against each other is wasteful. So is DSU's slogan aimed at other SD state schools?]