Anatomy of an IEDC Winning Website

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Northland Connection

Website Review and Agency Capabilities

Anatomy of an IEDC Winning Website

The Indy Partnership

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About Atlas AdvertisingAtlas Advertising helps economic developers reach national and international prospect and site selection audiences. We deliver branding, website development, GIS mapping, research, social media, and creative services professionally and with a staff experienced in economic development. Unlike firms with little or no economic development experience, Atlas Advertising uses a proven mix of economic development marketing tactics that generate interest from site selection audiences.

Atlas Advertising is led by a former economic development practitioner and has worked with 50+ different economic development clients in 30 states. Our approach and experience means that our campaigns generate an average of three to ten times the response of other campaigns.

Featured clients:– State of Ohio– Indy Partnership– City of San Francisco– Greater Phoenix Economic Council – Greater Omaha Economic Development Partnership

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Cool stuff to do/download

• Download our “Compete Smarter” webinars at our Slidespace, http://www.slideshare.net/wright0405

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• Read more at our Blog, “Latitude”: http://blog.atlas-advertising.com

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Outline – Anatomy of an IEDC Award Winning Website

1. About Indy Partnership

2. About the Project

3. About the Atlas approach

4. Seven components of a world class Economic Development website

5. More opportunities that exist online

6. What feedback do you have for Indy?

7. Questions

8. Wrap up

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About the Atlas approach• The first economic development website we worked on

was in 1995. • Since then, the usage of the web has grown

astronomically, new tools such as blogs and social media have come on the scene, and Google has risen to dominance.

• Atlas created the seven components of a successful website in 2004, and since then, it has undergone two major revisions.

• To develop the components and scoring, we conduct annual research with site selectors and prospects, and study actual usage data collected from ED websites in 37 states by Development Results.

• This thinking goes into every website Atlas works on in collaboration with our clients.

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About Indy Partnership

• Represent the 10-County Indianapolis region for business attraction and retention in Central Indiana

• Eleven total staff• Privately funded, and affiliated with the Central Indiana

Corporate Partnership • A relatively new (within two years) leadership at the staff

level• Ron Gifford, President and CEO Bio• Joshua Hall, Director of Marketing Bio• Matt Waldo, Director of Research Bio

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About the Project

1. To be the centerpiece of the region’s marketing programs for years to come

2. Competitively bid, including multiple local firms

3. Atlas chosen for two reasons:– More cost effective– National experience in working in Economic Development – Willingness to customize– Receptive to creating new things

4. Goals at the outset of the project:– Position The Indy Partnership as the preeminent one-stop-

shop for economic development services – Increase understanding of the advantages of relocating and

operating a business in the Indianapolis Region– Broadly distribute decision-influencing analysis of factual

pro-Indianapolis Region data to targeted audiences

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How Indy Partnership Approached it

1. Writing a strategy

2. Understanding the audience

3. Selecting the delivery mechanism

4. Committing the staff time

5. Starting content before the architecture was completed

6. Have continued to make changes to 80% of the pages since launch

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The result:

“The Indy Partnership has performed well for many years, but recent achievements and their ability to leverage regional assets, business cluster strengths, and good old-fashioned hard work and ingenuity have earned them an honored place among the top 10 economic development groups in the United States,” said Ron Starner, general manager for Site Selection magazine. “Even though it wasn’t part of the judging criteria for the top 10 groups, it’s worth noting that the new Indy Partnership website is one of the best economic development websites we’ve ever seen.”

Further, in October 2009, Indypartnership.com was given the International Economic Development Council’s award for Best Website for communities over 200,000 in population.

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Seven components of a world-class ED website• Authenticity of place branding and messaging• Clarity of navigation • Depth and quality of content• Use of search marketing approaches• Use of email marketing and news sections• Frequent performance tracking• Use of Maps and GIS technology• Use of new media

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Authenticity in place branding is…

• Communicating a true positioning of the region

• Utilizing recognizable national elements

• Capturing users’ attention to inspire them to use the site

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Indy Partnership Brand Score

Communicate a true positioning

of the region5 of 5

Utilize recognizable

national element of the region

2.5 of 5

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Clarity of navigation in websites is. . .

• A prospect-specific section placed prominently

• Utilizing IEDC data standards

• Providing the top ten most requested pages

• Keeping all valuable content three clicks or less from the homepage

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Top 10 pages requested nationally on ED websites

1. About Us (about the organization) 2. Programs (that the organization offers) 3. Data Center4. News 5. Relocate and Expand6. Find Property 7. Site Selection Services 8. Workforce data and Information 9. Database of Companies or Largest

Employers 10.Maps of the Area

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Indy Partnership Navigation Score

Use a site selector and/or prospect specific section

5 of 5

Provide IEDC data and the top 10 most requested

pages in intuitive places

5 of 5

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Great content is…

• Making content scannable

• Using a content management system that enables publishing of pages, downloadable documents, and data

• Weekly updates• Devoting half of

your budget to content

• Offering prominent contact info

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Indy Partnershipcontent score

Weekly updates 5 of 5

Using a content management system that

enables publishing of

pages, downloadable

documents, and data

5 of 5

Scannable & relevant content

5 of 5

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Effective use of search marketing is…

• Ranking #1 organically for “your geography economic development”

• Ranking in the top 5 organically for “your organization name”

• Utilizing paid search (PPC) to drive additional traffic

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Top 10 search terms that drive traffic to ED websites

1. Your organization name2. Your city/region name “economic

development”3. Incentive type offered in your region

(depends on community)4. Resident company name (i.e. Boeing)5. Region name (if different from city)6. Organizational url (without .com/.net.org)7. Campaign name (initiative or fundraising)8. City/region name “maps”9. City/region name “counties”10.City/region name “industries”

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Indy PartnershipSearch Score

#1 organically for “your geography economic

development”

0 of 5

Top 5 organically for “your organization

name”

5 of 5

Utilizing paid search (PPC) to drive

additional traffic

0 of 5

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Effective use of email and news is…• Monthly email

newsletter to investors, prospects

• Tracking performance of those newsletters

• Posting newsletters and news items to your website weekly or monthly

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Indy Partnership email & news score

Monthly email newsletter to investors,

prospects5 of 5

Newsletters and other news posted on site

weekly5 of 5

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Effective performance tracking is…• Receiving a report once per month• Not using “hits”• Tracking unique visits, referrers and downloads• Integrated tracking of advertising, web and PR

effectiveness

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Indy Partnershiptracking score

Receiving a report once per month

5 of 5

Tracking unique visits, referrers and

downloads

5 of 5

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Effective use of Maps and GIS technology is…

• Using maps with various layers (transportation, education, etc.)

• Using integrated real estate searches/GIS mapping software

• Generating dynamic demographic and business reports

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Indy Partnershipmaps score

Using maps with various layers

(transportation, education, etc.)

5 of 5

Using integrated real estate

searches/GIS mapping software

5 of 5

Generating dynamic

demographic and business reports

5 of 5

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Effective use of new media is…

• Linking between your website and your LinkedIn profile

• Keeping an active Twitter account

• Having a blog and updating it four times per week

• Incorporating Share It features on your site

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Indy Partnershipnew media score

Linking to your LinkedIn profiles

5 of 5

Frequently updated Twitter

and blog

5 of 5

Offering Share It features on site

5 of 5

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Atlas Review Level: Gold

Authenticity of place branding and messaging 7.5 out of 10

Clarity of navigation 10 out of 10

Depth and quality of content 15 out of 15

Use of search marketing approaches 5 out of 15

Use of email marketing and news sections 10 out of 10

Frequent performance tracking 10 out of 10

Use of Maps and GIS technology 15 out of 15

Use of new/social media 15 out of 15

Total 87.5

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Today’s opportunities online

• Content is king. The more of it you have, and the better it is displayed, the better your organization will do online.

• Clients who have control of their page, data, file, and photographic content do better in the long run. Make sure the content management system you choose gives you that ability.

• Integrated GIS makes the experience seamless for your users. Integrated GIS delivers 300% more property searches than other tools in many markets.

• Never forget your brand on your website. Your site will likely deliver more than 10x the experiences of any other marketing you do, almost always to those outside the region.

• Search engine marketing is the most cost effective, targeted way to deliver new leads to your organization. Remember to optimize, and pay per click is a must. In all, solid search engine marketing can increase traffic to your website by as much as 1000% within targeted audiences.

• Social media is a vast, untapped opportunity. Make sure that you direct users to your LinkedIn profiles, blog, Twitter account, and lets users share pages and content with others.

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Join our LinkedIn Group: Next Gen Economic Development

Marketers(Once you sign up, you will need to be

approved)

Then, click, the link on the presentation, in Discussions.

We look forward to having you!

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Contact Atlas

Contact information:

2601 Blake Street, Suite 301Denver, CO 80205

Contact: Ben Wrightt: 303.292.3300 x 210

[email protected]

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