Strategic Marketing Consultants

¦ SM   ¦ End Users   ¦ Touch-Points   ¦ Big Ideas   ¦ Marketing Audits

And Related Matters of Integrating Experiential Marketing
and Experiential Branding

Stonecreek has worked extensively over the years in applying a strategic marketing approach to products and projects, and at the enterprise level. Company founder Don Bredberg directed the creation of, and implementation, of the CityWalk Roll-Out Program for Universal Studios. CityWalk became the retail-entertainment industry?s example for branded "urban entertainment centers" - a type of "retail entertainment" shopping center.

Our strategic marketing consulting has extended to such other projects as Fashion Show Mall (Las Vegas), Casino Morongo gaming resort, Korakuen Amusement Park (at Tokyo Dome), the Zone at Glendale Galleria, and town center retail-entertainment projects at Crested Butte (Colorado), Rancho Santa Margarita (California), Marina del Rey (California), and many others.

Sustainable Competitive Advantage

We embrace the strategic marketing view of each assignment or project we engage. We seek what Peter Drucker has called " the sustainable competitive advantage.? Creating a project or product with unique attributes is a means of assuring maximum investment return and asset value. We also seek to apply "pragmatic creativity," recognizing that cutting-edge product ideas must be implementable within financial objectives and investor expectations.

Primacy of the End User

We are entirely focused on the end-user envisioned for any place or product - the guest, patron, shopper, customer, and/or buyer. A continuous focus on end-user wants, desires, fantasies, and needs, yields a customer-based view of the world, and a particular place or product, that in itself is a competitive advantage ... more

Competitive Environment

Consumers today have a wide array of places at which they may enjoy their leisure time including retail centers, restaurants, nightclubs, museums, family entertainment centers, theaters, sport facilities, theme parks, themed attractions, themed entertainment, musems & science centers, among many others. We have also seen a return to urban entertainment districts, historic districts, and the "great streets" of vibrant urban locations. To a varying extent, all these places compete with each other as alternative experiences for a consumer?s time and attention.

We refer to this place-based competitive marketplace for a consumer?s ?time at play? as the Destination Leisure Industry. As consultants to the evolution of strategic marketing views, we note that this great convergence of consumer expectations has also been characterized as being a part of the overall ?experience economy.?

In general, today's consumer, from child to retiree, has experienced high quality live performances, movies, theme parks, restaurants, and especially, recreation experiences. This is increasingly true even on a worldwide basis. Each person, each "end user" in this vast "theme park generation" is a sophisticated master of his or her own lifestyle and increasingly technology-savvy.

Despite such sophistication, as strategic marketing consultants we believe it is straightforward to figure out what consumers are after: During each person?s leisure time, enjoyment of their personal time with children, parents, extended family, spouse (or girlfriend/boyfriend), and friends and associates, is the whole point. We all want to seek or feel satisfaction with the quality of our relationships and the quality of our leisure-time experiences. We're quite literally in the "shared" experience business, a part of the Experience Economy.

Areas of Strategic Marketing

In the end, strategic marketing includes four functional areas: 1) having something for people to buy (product), 2) finding people who will buy (a place or product), 3) encouraging people to buy (promotion), 4) and providing value (price for product). Together, these areas of interest form a basis of strategic marketing, and are most successful when applied and integrated with all aspects of planning, design, development, sales and marketing, operations, and promotions.

A Bias Towards Action

The truly great organizations have well-honed methodologies for product concepting, ideation, musing on "big ideas" then proceeding to evaluate strategic marketing alternatives and proceeding with rigorous implementation.

Maintaining a balanced view of strategic marketing's "1-2" punch may be essential to success - time for thinking and time for doing should probably be divided 50/50. For most other organizations, taking a comprehensive strategic marketing view can stretch organizational resources and commitment. Great front-end thinking and group consensus-building can lose its edge once the matter of implementation is finally reached.

Marketing Audits

A frequently overlooked area of value enhancement, particularly for distressed properties, is the cost and effectiveness of a facility's marketing program. To assist an owner in evaluating marketing programs, Stonecreek LLC conducts property and portfolio marketing audits, and identifies proactive strategies for owners to implement to improve revenue levels

A marketing audit and resulting enhancement plan, can provide a focused management tool for increased cash flow. The audit typically includes a detailed review of the market positioning of the property, including a site analysis, that reviews the merits of location, area development, available markets, and prospective end-user demand.

The marketing audit can also examine the marketing organization's effectiveness, productivity, functional relationships internal and external the sales and marketing effort. As well, issues such as human resources, referral marketing, image marketing, reservation call tracking, lead generation, and reliability of the facility's market niche, can all be examined.

Customer Touch-Points in Strategic Marketing

A company's product, image, and brand are visible and quite palpable with every touch-point the company has with its public - whether guest or customer, financial institutions, or government agencies. It is useful to view all aspects of public interaction, and the materials used during this interaction, as the organization's "strategic marketing platform." ... more