Globe Series on Tourism in Toronto

[syn]

^I'd say you can sell "the feel" of neighbourhoods and cities it's just that Toronto hasn't found a marketing group able to do that.

I mean, "Toronto Unlimited"? What were they thinking?

I would also say that there are a lot of people in the GTA who don't really know Toronto that well either...and certainly aren't qualified to give advice to tourists.

 

[jn_12]

Oh I agree. I don't think anyone likes "Toronto Unlimited".

I would say that the biggest issue is that both the city and even more so the province don't want to look like they're playing favourites. When I worked for the province's tourism policy department there was as much or more focus on SW Ontario than Niagara or Toronto. And the second you tried to focus on one of those two, you'd get some complaining from SWO or some other Ontario region.

At the municipal level, I worked for the InfoTOgo program and we were always telling people to see the neighbourhoods, or at least make an evening of one of them. You never know how successful you are at this because unless they come back and tell you they enjoyed it, you won't know if they followed your advice. However, the city's attempts to not play favourites meant that some days we were sent to some event in north west Etobicoke instead of something big downtown.

Essentially the problem with selling neighbourhoods is that you wind up playing favourites. Which neighbourhood do we sell without making it generic?

 

[syn]

Oh I agree. I don't think anyone likes "Toronto Unlimited".

I would say that the biggest issue is that both the city and even more so the province don't want to look like they're playing favourites. When I worked for the province's tourism policy department there was as much or more focus on SW Ontario than Niagara or Toronto. And the second you tried to focus on one of those two, you'd get some complaining from SWO or some other Ontario region.

At the municipal level, I worked for the InfoTOgo program and we were always telling people to see the neighbourhoods, or at least make an evening of one of them. You never know how successful you are at this because unless they come back and tell you they enjoyed it, you won't know if they followed your advice. However, the city's attempts to not play favourites meant that some days we were sent to some event in north west Etobicoke instead of something big downtown.

Essentially the problem with selling neighbourhoods is that you wind up playing favourites. Which neighbourhood do we sell without making it generic?

Well, I suppose you don't really have to play favourites. You can start with the more popular ones then move on to others. A lot of neighbourhoods are so close together visitors are going to visist more than one.

Besides, advertising neighbourhoods isn't about getting tourists to those specific neighbourhoods, but advertising the city as a whole and giving them an idea of what it's about.

 

[jn_12]

Well, I suppose you don't really have to play favourites. You can start with the more popular ones then move on to others.

But that's playing favourites. People with a vested interest in having tourists visit these neighbourhoods don't understand the concept of "you're next on the list." How skeptical would you be if you were told that we're going to do an ad campaign for St Lawrence, Distillery and Yonge/Dundas first and then we'll get to your neighbourhood after that? It'd be tough to believe.

Besides, advertising neighbourhoods isn't about getting tourists to those specific neighbourhoods, but advertising the city as a whole and giving them an idea of what it's about.

But the only way to sell the city from a tourism perspective is through landmarks. Otherwise the image of people enjoying themselves on the street could be anywhere. Ya, we'd know its the Annex, but it very well could be a street in Montreal or Boston to a tourist. You need to differentiate yourself, and there's no way you can do that by showing anything but landmarks that people recognize.

 

[syn]

But that's playing favourites. People with a vested interest in having tourists visit these neighbourhoods don't understand the concept of "you're next on the list." How skeptical would you be if you were told that we're going to do an ad campaign for St Lawrence, Distillery and Yonge/Dundas first and then we'll get to your neighbourhood after that? It'd be tough to believe.



But the only way to sell the city from a tourism perspective is through landmarks. Otherwise the image of people enjoying themselves on the street could be anywhere. Ya, we'd know its the Annex, but it very well could be a street in Montreal or Boston to a tourist. You need to differentiate yourself, and there's no way you can do that by showing anything but landmarks that people recognize.

Well, my first and second points are linked. You aren't playing favourites because you're really advertising the entire city. It's kind of like suggesting highlighting only landmarks is playing favourites.

No one is going to visit just the Distillery or just Kennsington. You can't just advertise landmarks or neighbourhoods. You ahve to do both. I've seen a lot of tourism campaigns that don't focus on just landmarks.

 

[MartinMtl]

This is how Toronto should sell it's landmarks AND it's neighborhood (check the video - it's quite nice):

http://www.tourisme-montreal.org/

 

[Hank]

Wow...that was a great video. That's exactly the kind of thing we could use more of in Toronto. Kind of reminds me of those 'You Belong Here' commercials of the post-SARS advertisement phase. I thought those did a good job of showing off parts of Toronto AND they had a catchy song.

I also like how the Montreal video lets people click at various points to find out more about the neighbourhoods being shown at that point in the video. Well done.