Holistic place marketing: Starting from zero
Most destination marketing structures weren’t designed purposefully from scratch. They were built over time, iterating off previous models and refined through practice and natural evolution.
New mandates were added. Teams were split or combined. Priorities changed. The result is a system that works, but one that can also feel fragmented at times.
Invest functions don't always talk to Visit or Work functions. What should be leveraged for B2B channels are limited to B2C, and vice versa. Organisations work toward their own mandate without always considering the greater good across mandates.
So as place leaders, what if we looked at this from a different angle?
In his book Effortless, author Greg McKeown outlines the principle of “start with zero.” Instead of adding complexity on top of an imperfect system, what if we strip things back and rebuild from scratch with intention?
That’s the exercise below.
While completely unrealistic, what if we rebuilt our destination management structure from the very beginning? How would we do so and what lessons can we learn from that?
Each place has its own nuances so this isn't perfect; however, it is a way to understand where value sits and how a more connected model could take shape. Indulge me for a few minutes and enjoy the ride. At the end, I would love to hear what you think.
Defining the core mandates
For the sake of simplicity let's call our place Atlantis, a dynamic micro nation that shares characteristics across cities, regions/states, and countries.
At a high level, it has a robust set of mandates similar to many of those we see today. In starting from scratch, we're able to find a home for all of them, as opposed to excluding some because they don't fit the current system. Here is a breakdown, and where each responsibility generally sits within government:
Ministry of Economy
Invest: attract companies to establish operations in the location
Build: attract real estate and infrastructure investment for development projects
Venture: attract private equity and venture capital into the ecosystem
Startup: support the creation and growth of local startups
Enterprise: help domestic companies expand into international markets
Ministry of Tourism
Meet: attract conferences, conventions and business events
Visit: attract leisure and business visitors
Ministry of Labor and Workforce Competitiveness
Work: attract skilled workers to relocate
Study: attract international students
Research: attract academic talent
Ministry of Public Policy
Live: ensure a livable, functional and attractive environment for residents
With the definitions stated, let’s look at how to connect these.
One function to connect them all
Rather than asking each group to promote itself, we would introduce a central function we’ll call Brand, which would sit under a new, dedicated Ministry of Reputation and Attractiveness.
This team doesn’t replace the others; it would sit across them. Its role is to manage how the place is understood and experienced. That includes brand, perception tracking, campaign coordination and strategic alignment. Just as important, it maintains direct links into each ministry so the story being told matches what is actually happening.
We’ve seen versions of this approach emerge in different forms, as we explored recently around an emerging new phase of place marketing. Some places consolidate under one organization. Others align through shared branding and coordination. The structure matters less than the outcome. The goal is to avoid telling five different stories about the same place.
Management first, marketing second
Place marketing is often treated as a communications function which, as an external marketing partner for places, we certainly appreciate. Campaigns go out, content is produced, and results are tracked in clicks or leads. But those outputs sit downstream from bigger decisions.
In this “start from zero” model, the central Brand team operates as a management function, under which the marketing capabilities rest.
If talent perception is weak, that is not just a messaging issue. If investors see barriers, that is not solved with better ads. The role of this team is to surface those gaps and work across ministries to address them.
Marketing still matters. Campaigns, content and distribution all play a role in making Atlantis findable to decision-makers. But they sit within a broader mandate of shaping how the place performs and how it is perceived.
What success actually looks like
If the role expands, so do the metrics. And at the top is perception.
How a place is viewed influences whether people visit, invest or move. Tracking that consistently provides an early signal of progress, and it sits at the core of the Brand team’s mandate.
But perception is also a shared KPI across every ministry. Tourism, investment, talent and public policy each influence how the place is experienced, so each function carries responsibility for improving it alongside its own core metrics (similar to how we’ve recommended “reputation” be included as an investment promotion KPI).
The Brand team’s role is to measure, guide and challenge. They track perception, identify gaps and work across ministries to ensure it is moving in the right direction. The ministries, in turn, are accountable for delivering the outcomes that actually move needles.
Alongside perception, broader performance metrics still matter. GDP growth, labor participation, tourism contribution and business activity all feed into the same outcome. No single team owns them outright, but all contribute, with clear lines of responsibility for each.
This structure keeps long-term perception from being sidelined by short-term targets, while still tying it directly to real performance.
A funding model that reflects reality
Structure only works if it is supported properly. A public-private partnership model makes the most sense here. Public funding provides stability and alignment with policy goals, primarily supporting the management role of the destination management organisation for Atlantis.
Private contributions bring accountability and additional scale, primarily used for the marketing function. Businesses, developers and institutions all benefit from how a place is perceived, so giving them a role in funding helps align priorities, it ensures that locals own a piece of the external narrative to keep it in line with the desired results.
To avoid constant resets, strategy should be set on a five-year cycle, with flexibility depending on political timelines. The next plan should be in motion before the current one ends.
Building the right team
The structure within the Brand team and beyond should reflect how the work actually happens. At the centre is a branding and insights team. This group has view across all mandates, identifies overlaps and ensures consistency. It also spots opportunities where efforts can reinforce each other.
Alongside that sit thematic team members plugged into the 11 mandates across economy, tourism, workforce and public policy. Resources are allocated based on priority rather than evenly distributed, with funding shifting based on how Atlantis is growing in each of these areas.
This creates a matrix structure. Teams collaborate across functions while still focusing on their core audiences. The size of the team depends on the scale of the place and the level of ambition.
Where to focus first
Even with a clean structure, priorities matter. And that structure is determined by the destination’s maturity level. For locations where cross-functional demand is light, tourism sits at the front, at least to start. It is the fastest way to build awareness and shape perception at scale. Visitors experience the place directly, and those impressions travel.
With a certain level of destination maturity where demand is moderate, the focus moves to talent next. Work, study and research all sit here, closely tied to both tourism and the economy. In many cases, companies follow talent, not the other way around.
When deman is high, resources should move to inward investment, but with flexibility. Focus can shift between attracting companies, supporting startups, driving exports or enabling development depending on what Atlantis needs most.
This is a beginning structure, but not necessarily a constant or the end. For example, as Atlantis sees an explosion of tourism and receives input from public policy that locals have concerns, focus areas shift to workforce, economy, and public policy priorities.
How promotion evolves over time
Destinations at different stages in their maturity must fall back on certain attributes that will determine their ability to graduate to the next stage. We'll call these three stages Ascension, Attention and Retention, in that order of holistic destination maturity.
In the earliest stage, Ascension, the focus is on establishing credibility. Budgets are tighter, so effort leans toward targeted activity, with the biggest allocation going to place making, aka product development. Partnerships, in-person engagement and direct outreach matter most when communicating with external audiences. This is more bottom-of-funnel than it might appear, with an emphasis on trust and relationships.
As momentum builds, the focus shifts toward Attention, or harnessing visibility. Investment in broader campaigns increases, with more weight on awareness-driving activations. A rough split here is 70% top-of-funnel and 30% bottom-of-funnel (which is inverted from what many locations do today). At this stage, real progress in policy and development starts to carry the message, with the marketing role to add fuel to the fire.
In a more mature phase, the balance evens out. Awareness and conversion sit closer to 50-50 or, perhaps 30-70. The focus is on maintaining reputation, reinforcing strengths and staying competitive, while dialing up where needed, when it is needed.
This is overly simplistic but these phases describe how marketing activity evolves through a location's maturity. The management structure remains consistent throughout, even as promotion fluctuates.
If we started again…
No place gets to start from zero. But this exercise helps identify where things can improve and what is possible with fresh thinking.
The goal is never to rebuild everything. Instead, it is to be more intentional about how functions connect, where efficiencies can be found, how priorities are set, and how success is measured.
