LEDF stepping up marketing strategy

<b>Marketing budget has increased 450 percent over 5-year period</b>

by Carla Knapp

Getting the Logansport and Cass County names out to the right people has been a top priority for the Logansport-Cass County Economic Development Foundation, so much so that over the past five years LEDF’s marketing budget has increased 450 percent.

“We’re in competition with everyone else,” said LEDF President Skip Kuker, noting that there are about 15,000 other economic development professionals throughout the country with the same priority. “We’ve got to be out in front of people telling them that we’re there.”

The foundation’s marketing initiative was a main point during Kuker’s annual report attended by several city and county officials Thursday afternoon.

Kuker said the foundation’s marketing budget for 2008 will be $44,000, up from $8,000 in 2004. Excluding the marketing numbers, LEDF’s overall budget during that same five-year period is down 1 percent.

The marketing budget includes advertising campaigns, target mailers, consultant visits and trade show appearances, and the campaign is aimed at getting information to potential business investors about what Logansport and Cass County have to offer.

In reviewing the last 12 months, Kuker said one of the big changes in the marketing strategy was LEDF’s new advertising campaign with a national magazine for site selectors. Kuker said LEDF had bought advertisements in four national magazines that target industry professionals. The biggest magazine has a circulation of roughly 40,000 while the others circulate around 25,000 copies nationwide.

To determine where the advertising dollars are spent, Kuker said, he monitors the hits on LEDF’s Web site for a three-day period after the magazine comes out. He said he has chosen these four periodicals because they have shown the biggest increase in hits.

“If a magazine doesn’t provide what we need, then we stop that and find something else,” said Kuker, noting that Web hits have more than doubled since 2006.

He also said that the Web is the biggest research tool used by site selectors, who can be real estate agents, attorneys or corporate officials looking for new areas to expand.

Kuker said the foundation had also discussed advertising at airports in Indianapolis and other Midwestern cities, but otherwise, most of LEDF’s marketing strategy would go unnoticed by the general public.

“We are out there, but the local person is probably not going to see our ads,” he said.

Still, Kuker said he tried to keep business and political officials in the county up to date on LEDF’s incentives and any projects through his monthly president’s report at the LEDF board meeting.

On Thursday, Kuker recapped some of the foundation’s successes, including the Anderson’s Clymers Ethanol Plant and the Holiday Inn Express. While those are projects that came to fruition, Kuker says he also follows up on those that don’t.

“If a project fails, we want to know why,” he said. “We’re in competition with other communities, so sometimes we come in second and sometimes we come in fourth, but we want to know why.”

Several city and county officials at the annual report praised Kuker’s efforts to bring business opportunities to the area and said they were happy to support the foundation’s marketing initiatives.

“I think it’s something we have to support,” said newly elected City Councilman Chuck LaDow. “Like Skip talked about, it’s not local community versus local community, it’s a global economy. In order to be competitive and have a shot at getting the big industry here, we have to get out there and be a player in the game.”

Carla Knapp can be contacted at (574) 732-5150 or via e-mail at carla.knapp@pharostribune.com

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