How do we discuss the merits of a guide for our area?

You might begin by having a conversation by discussing the terms marketing and advertising. It helps to have everyone on the same page with these terms.

In the case of a business district brochure, we recommend to primarily consider it a group marketing tool. View marketing as setting the table for advertising “to work”. In other words, marketing makes it easier for all of your other public relations, advertising and sales efforts to connect with your target audiences.

What is the advertising function of a guide? 

When a printed guide brochure is viewed, let’s say to plan an errand run of several stops, that interaction allows the viewer to discover the name of an unfamiliar business. At that moment, with that user, the guide has served as a Brand Awareness and Location Awareness ad for the discovered business. Now if the guide has a phone directory, by category, the potential discovery process is increased higher. In other words, advertising happens when the brochure viewer makes a connection to the information presented.

Usually a guide has several key sponsors. For these underwriters there’s space set aside for sharing an offering touching on three ad types: Brand, Product & Location Awareness. With some additional dedicated space on the brochure, photo images can serve as a key attention draw for creating a positive impression of Area Ambiance, the fourth type of advertising.

• Brand Awareness: Your company name or logo

• Product/Service Awareness: Your offering of what you do

• Location Awareness: Where your business is located

• Area Ambiance Awareness: The pleasant environment of your business area

Who is our potential target audience?

Each town commerce area’s geographic radius and demographics will vary. The bigger the draw of several individual businesses PLUS the pleasing aesthetics of that group setting PLUS plentiful parking, would EQUAL a large potential magnet area = a huge geographic radius.

Now say you don’t have the area draw of a hospital, hotel, beer hall; what then? Well you still have current businesses that pull customers from somewhere, right? From how far away do they come to run their errands, pickup meals or go to the doctor? The key is to find out, in general, from where they hail and build out from your center.

From how many towns away do we draw?

Let’s say you agree it’s a 1 town radius.

You could set a realistic radius as residents from within your town, PLUS your neighboring towns, as POTENTIAL patrons for your area.

Perhaps your town, plus every town it borders to equal a 6 town total radius. Then the number of households contained within this 6 town radius could serve as the focus of your marketing effort.

That’s a key data point that answers the question of: How many guides might we need to make a fresh impression? For example, if a direct mail version of your guide would be mailed to a 6 town radius, then a minimum print volume would be calculated from the number of households.

Where does our committee go next?

You are welcome to begin Step 1. Define the project by answering these questions.

• How many shopping zones does your town have?

• What is the geometric shape of your district(s)?

• Which local businesses have the largest radius of customers?

• Would a birds-eye overview help direct visitors to the commerce area(s)?