First Posted: 6/17/2014
Columbus is marketing itself to young adults by pretending that it isn’t marketing itself.
I know that sounds wacky, but I’m told there is a reason for it.
The target audience of people 25 to 35 grew up being barraged by advertising, so they greatly resist sales pitches, explained Amy Tillinghast, marketing vice president at Experience Columbus.
“They’re going to know when they’re being sold, and they’re going to reject it,” she said. “They don’t want to be sold. They want to discover.”
(I wish that 60-year-olds had the same reputation. I’m sick of Cialis ads.)
Experience Columbus put up a billboard this month in Chicago for the marketing-resistant young to discover. It shows a smiling, bearded man and the words “Where standing out never means standing alone.” Below that are the Web address LifeinCbus.com and the “ColumbUS” logo.
The billboard was positioned along the traffic-clogged Kennedy Expressway (I-90) in the hope of catching the eyes of harried young adults weary of sitting in Chicago traffic. Tillinghast tells me that is called a “pain point.”
If the frazzled Chicagoans go to LifeinCbus.com, they will find links to articles about Columbus collected from the Web and a 60-second video of people working and playing in Columbus. Without narration, the few lines of text (“Where blank canvases become full lives”) are meant to reinforce the message that Columbus is diverse, energetic, welcoming and maybe even hip.
Experience Columbus has also placed ads in Metro stations in Washington (more pain points) and videos in Washington and Chicago office elevators. (I hope they don’t cause people to start associating Columbus with pain points. That could be bad.)
“Where the cost of living is more living than cost,” one D.C. ad reads. In other words: It is cheaper here but stimulating.
The campaign, which includes Internet ads in those cities, is aimed at luring “young transitionals” – creative, influential people open to relocating. It isn’t a tourism pitch, so no zoo, no Dublin step dancers, no Ohio State Buckeyes. (But Columbus Crew fans make an appearance.)
There is also no tag line (“Discover Columbus,” “Columbus: More Than You Dreamed,” etc.). So it sounds less like Columbus desperately trying to convince itself of its own worth.
The ads will run through August, and it might be years before anyone knows whether they worked, Tillinghast said.
“This is pure image. This is pure planting a seed. We want to start putting those little thoughts in their heads.”
If that sounds like marketing, don’t tell the transitionals.
