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NATIONAL ARTS MARKETING PROJECT: Walton Arts Center
The Arts & Business Council of Americans for the Arts does many terrific things to help advance the arts in the business sector. One of their most effective endeavors is the National Arts Marketing Project, which was initially launched with the financial support and vision of American Express. This year’s conference is also supported by Altria, another good corporate citizen with a history of helping the arts sector advance.
At this year’s conference in Los Angeles, on Sunday, April 30, from 10:45-12:00 PM, Terri Trotter, External Affairs Vice President from the Walton Arts Center and I will be presenting a session about the Center’s brand development process.
If you’re like me, you’re probably asking yourself why you would be interested in hearing yet another session on branding. What’s going to be different here?
For me, the remarkable difference in Walton Arts Center’s case is their very sophisticated understanding of what branding entails and what’s necessary to keep the brand promise. After spending over a year in research, development and implemention of the brand strategy in communications terms, the Center commenced a year-long process to assess and strengthen its capacity to keep its brand promise: Walton Arts Center makes the good life in Northwest Arkansas even better.
The Center’s tag line, Life is Sweet, was taken seriously as a personal goal to be achieved by every staff member, from the maintenance engineer to the President. Every staff member was personally interviewed and each were asked, “How do you make life sweet for Walton Arts Center patrons?� and “How might you better do so?�
This process resulted in a complete re-structuring of the Center’s staff, including the number and composition of organizational departments and responsible Vice Presidents. Every position within the organization was assessed by the engagement team, with active support and participation that included the Center’s Human Resources Officer.
The Center operationalized its brand strategy in a number of other powerful ways, as well. A set of key performance indicators (KPIs) were generated by each of the business units. Baselines were created in a benchmarking process so that organizational performance improvements could be clearly measurable. Walton Arts Center approached its brand-building process from a system standpoint, not just in typical terms: a communications exercise that produces a new logo, tag line, and selling strategy.
Another remarkable difference will be revealed in both the methodology and final work products that were created by Walton Arts Center’s brand designer: DOXA (www.doxa.biz). In a sector where almost all communications design is tactical and situation-specific, DOXA’s approach to design is strategic. Their methodology doesn’t create graphic design, per se, it creates a visual vocabulary. This is analogous to a great choreographer like Martha Graham, all of whose works reveal and deploy a movement vocabulary – not just a set of dances. It is the vocabulary that creates the brand arc, not the brilliance of any one expression.
Concurrent with this exercise, the Center’s Planning and Finance department worked on an ABC analysis (Activity Based Costing) to better inform the organization about the real benefits, costs, impacts, and priorities of every Center business unit. This analysis was undertaken to better inform Board Members and Senior Leadership about how the Center’s primary policy document – its budget – aligned with the brand strategy and with organizational objectives.
A key success factor in this engagement was the deployment of the players. Terri Trotter, Vice President of Communications acted as staff lead in the brand research and development process. She handed the process off to Tracy Cude, the Center’s CFO, who ran the organizational development phase. Through the whole process, Anita Scism, the Center’s president was a tireless and devoted “brand champion.�
Though our presentation will only run an hour, we are looking forward to telling this remarkable story. Those that are there will learn how the research, trends, and methodology drove the strategy development. They’ll gain insights about translating research, strategy, optimization, and focus into creative products that are intended to engage and sustain the audiences and the community. We’re looking forward to it very much.
Obviously, ours will be just one of many terrific sessions. I hope I’ll see you there at the conference. It’s going to be a terrific event !
If you’re interested in attending the conference here is the link where you can find more information:
www.AmericansForTheArts.org/NAMPC
Here’s the session description:
In reviewing Walton Arts Center’s 3-year brand strategy process, participants learn how the Center spent a year locating, developing, and implementing its brand, and then redesigned its organizational structure to optimize keeping the brand promise. Participants will learn about applying various discovery tools including analytics, geo-demographic analysis, quantitative research, and message and design testing. Brand launch strategies will be presented, ranging from staff, volunteer and board training sessions to media relations planning & execution. Participants learn how the Center benchmarked baselines and developed metrics strategies to evaluate process outcomes. The session concludes with an analysis of outcomes, portraying community relations and organizational performance impacts resulting in a clarified mission focus, increased fund development, aligned communications strategies, and sustained sales growth.
Posted on February 15, 2006 07:39 AM | Permalink
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Comments
I wonder if this study could be a template for other Performing Arts Centers in small markets. Walton has achieved considerable profile, but how much of that is drawn from the implied clout of the family?