Chamber Works To Re-Brand Dayton

DAYTON - Dayton's marketing approach is get- ting a facelift and residents are sure to reap the rewards of the anticipated boost in tourism.

Some of the changes are already in effect. Advertise- ments are rolling out with the new slogan suggested by the AMI Advertising Agency and selected by the Day- ton Chamber of Commerce board of directors, "Expect the Unexpected," Director of Advertising at AMI Jeff Wright said.

The board sent out a re- quest for proposals last October to several advertising agencies in the area and selected AMI in February.

The campaign included analysis of Dayton's current advertising in an attempt to find deficiencies in their cur- rent marketing, Wright said.

Because this was an un- planned budget item, the chamber has received gener- ous grants and donations to make this advertising cam- paign possible.

Wright said the tight-knit community helps attendance for local events. While those attendees are important, Wright said city advertising needs to branch out to bring in more outside revenue and attendance.

"The Dayton community is extremely strong," Wright said. "That common strength helps pull everything to- gether."

Wright said the study AMI conducted showed about 45 percent of Dayton's advertising money was be- ing spent locally as opposed to reaching out to people outside the Dayton community. Local organizations are being encouraged to push advertisements out to a wider audience; for example, the Boldman House Museum advertisement currently run- ning on National Public Radio.

The study also revealed inconsistencies in ads, Wright said. Designs, taglines and even fonts were inconsistent and by creating advertisements that are more consistent, they will be more effective, Wright said.

He also said a major setback causing the inconsistencies was the fact that the advertisements had been created under two differ- ent chamber directors who had two very different ideas about what ads should focus on.

Another issue was pre- packaged advertisements, which were placed as televi- sion commercials and print ads with no cohesion linking them together, Wright said.

Once AMI was awarded the bid for Dayton's rebrand- ing, they set to work repair- ing the disjointed advertising and spending time in Dayton to better understand the community.

"Our firm really embraces the (Dayton) community," Wright said. "The great part about our firm is we get to choose who we work with and we feel really positive about the Dayton area, it's got a lot of personality."

Wright said he wants to bring out this personality in the advertisements AMI cre- ates for Dayton. Several ads have already been drawn up focusing on the variety of activities in Dayton as well as the history the town has to offer. As an effort to make the community even more of a focus, AMI will be putting out an all-call for photos, which will be used in some of the ads.

"It'll provide more of a community feel," Wright said. "It's important that the community can band together."

Chamber Director Brad McMasters said he is pleased with the work done by AMI and his predecessors.

"They put together a re- ally beautiful package," Mc- Masters said. "They really went above and beyond."

He said Dayton's advertis- ing will vary depending on the season and will be target- ing a wider audience than it has in the past.

The updates will continue to come up as the year progresses. McMasters and Wright met on Monday, July 9, to discuss changes coming to the Dayton Chamber of Commerce website.

"People will start to see changes on the website in three to five weeks," Mc- Masters said. "It's our no. 1 priority. We need it to be more open and easier to work with."

Wright said the website is one of the first things people interested in Dayton will see so he hoped to make it as inviting as possible.

"The new website will have a unique look with some of the old elements," Wright said. "People are coming to Dayton for recreation, food and history so we are promoting them all equally."

The changes won't stop there. AMI created a detailed calendar for the chamber to use for organizing advertis- ing for the city and for events as well as to see where the city could use more events to keep tourists coming into town.

McMasters said he hopes to implement new ideas to help create more diversity at events that might be losing steam. While most of the ideas are still in the works and under wraps, he did reveal a tentative plan to cre- ate re-enactments depicting Dayton's history to coincide with an annual event in town.

"We've had nothing but positive feedback about the idea," McMasters said. "If it develops, it will be a shared event between multiple shareholders so it can be achievable. Everyone already works so hard, it's hard to add new things."