The document outlines seven keys to high performance in economic development as discussed by Atlas Advertising, providing insights from various case studies. It emphasizes the importance of measurable outcomes, strategic marketing, and learning from successful communities, highlighting challenges and tactics from case studies in Nashville, Richmond, and Brenham. Ultimately, the document advocates for the adaptation of modern practices to enhance community economic vitality and competitiveness.

1. 7 Keys to High
Performance Economic
Development in 2013
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2. Your hosts
Ben Wright Guillermo Mazier
CEO, Atlas Advertising Business Development,
benw@atlas-advertising.com Atlas Advertising
www.twitter.com/atlasad guillermom@atlas-advertising.com
www.twitter.com/atlasad
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3. About Atlas Advertising
Atlas Advertising is a niche economic development marketing and technology firm that
helps economic developers reach local, national and international prospect and site
selection audiences. Atlas’ economic development solutions and websites have been
named among the best in the country by the IEDC and Angelou Economics, and have
won awards regionally from business to business marketing organizations.
Atlas has worked with 90+ different economic development clients in 43+ US states and 6
countries. Our approach and experience means that our campaigns generate an average of
three to ten times the response of other campaigns.
Featured clients:
– Denver South EDP
– State of Ohio
– Charleston County, SC
– Omaha, NE
– San Francisco, CA
– Webster City, IA
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4. View the slides, continue the
dialogue
• Continue the Conversation:
– Follow us on Twitter:
www.twitter.com/AtlasAd
– Tweet questions using hashtag
#AskAtlas
– Join Next Gen Economic
Development Marketers LinkedIn
Group
• View and share the slides with
your colleagues (available now):
http://bit.ly/fQB6hC 4

5. Questions we will answer
1. How do we as a profession feel about the impact we are making
on our communities today?
2. What are the basic principles that should drive your economic
development marketing?
3. How do we define success as a profession?
4. Who are the top performing communities in the nation in 2012?
5. What can we learn from high performing communities?
6. How can we evaluate our own past performance, and plan for
our future performance?
7. How can we implement high performing marketing programs in
our own communities? 5

6. Cutting through the clutter: The
world we work in
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8. 8

9. Do we as economic developers
make a difference?
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10. A few principles that drive
(or should drive)
economic development
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11. “Economic development organizations increasingly
operate under much tighter budgets at a time when
the need for economic development programming is
becoming more crucial to the continued vitality and
competitiveness of a community.”
International Economic Development Council in
“High Performing Economic Development Organizations,” 2011
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12. What worked 20 years ago is
not the same as what
works today.
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13. What hasn’t changed:
To make a difference, we have to serve
companies directly.
If we are not having
conversations, we are not making a
difference.
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14. What has changed:
The ways we start conversations have
changed forever.
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15. A simple framework to help define
success:
High Performance
Economic Development
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16. What “High Performance
Economic Development” is
• It is the first measurement of the
outcomes (Inquiries, jobs, capital
investment) that EDO’s create
on this scale.
• It proves the ways we make a
difference, and in some
cases, the ways we don’t.
• It can help drive your strategic
and marketing planning using
actual outcomes, instead of
activities, using national
benchmarks as your guide.
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17. The framework:
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20. ED success: benchmarked
results by population size
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21. Get the report:
http://www.slideshare.net/wright040
5/atlas-high-performance-economic-
development-white-paper
Take the survey to
participate:
http://atlas-
advertising.com/Community-
Benchmarking-Study.aspx 21

22. What can we learn from the top
performers?
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23. Your panelists
Janet Miller Sara Dunnigan Clint Kolby
Chief Economic Development Senior VP, Existing Business Services Project Manager
Officer & Talent Development Brenham Economic
Nashville Area Chamber of Greater Richmond Partnership Development Foundation
Commerce
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Email Email Email
jmiller@nashvillechamber.com Sdunnigan@grpva.com clint@brenhamtexas.com

24. Case Study 1: Nashville Area Chamber
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25. Nashville Challenges
• “Music City” brand
association with old-line
country music can paint
negative image for business
• Shortage of IT workforce
with 5+ years experience
limiting factor on tech-
company growth
• National attention to state
legislature and political
infighting around
immigration, incentives, etc. 25
damaging for state image

26. Nashville Goals
• Annual dashboard of metrics include:
– Job growth – 12,500/year
– Per Capita Income growth – 1.6%
– Population growth – 1.5%/year
– Increase GDP – 2.3% /year
– Relocations & Expansions
• Number, Jobs, Cap Investment, Square Footage, Jobs
Retained
– Internal Metrics – prospect visits by industry sector; % ratio
of RFP’s to site visits, etc.
• Successful launch and implementation of IT recruitment project
including
– Number of tech jobs created, time to fill, etc.
• Legislative scorecard
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27. 27

28. 28

29. Nashville Tactics
• Get the tools
right..nashvilleareainfo.com;
RFP process and design;
slide decks
• Consistent marketing over a
period of years to target
audiences………site
selection consultants #1
– Music = Creativity is the
message
• Play to strengths rather than
weakness – e.g. health care
services versus biotech
• Policy work on state and 29
local level…

30. 30

31. Nashville Results
• Ranked number one for job
growth in Atlas Advertising 2012
survey of ECD groups
• Top Ten Economic Development
Group in America, Site Selection
Magazine, 2011
• City named:
– #1 – Kiplinger’s “Future Job Creating Machines”,
2012
– #3 – “Future Boomtowns”, Forbes 2012
– #2 – Top Start Up Paradise, Young Entrepreneur
Council 2012
– #3 – Overall America’s Best Cities, Travel + Leisure
2012
– #2 – Most Cost-Attractive Business Location,31
KPMG 2012
– Top 10 U.S. Culture Cities – Homes Dot Com, 2012

32. The Corporate Relocation Story
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33. Nashville Learning's
• Embrace who you are
• Public-private sector
leadership is key
• Metrics matter
• Acknowledging weakness is
first step to tackling it
• People will fund what they
are passionate about
– Nashville Entrepreneur Center
Launch
– Tech Talent Campaign
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34. Case Study 2:
Greater Richmond Partnership
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35. Richmond Region Challenges
• Bringing together 4 strong localities
around shared vision
• Integrating private sector investors
and interests
• Relatively successful – no crisis
• Diverse economy – no single strong
industry “identity”
• Slow growth economy, competitive
neighbors
• Existing business program needed a
boost
• Little brand awareness
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• Tight labor market

36. Greater Richmond
Work Program
• Business Attraction Regional Marketing
• Business Retention and Expansion
• New Business Formation & Small Business Support
• Talent Development and Promotion
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37. Greater Richmond Tactics
• Sound foundation in strategic
plan – clear message to investors
and community
– Our work has impact - economic
impact
• Revisited the plan assumptions –
cluster study
• Reoriented work programs to
support the above goals
• Developed internal scorecards
and management tools
• Refined data systems and tracking
methodology 37

38. Greater Richmond Tactics
• Business Attraction Regional Marketing
– Cluster Focus
– Domestic/International
– Engage Stakeholders
• Business Retention and Expansion
– Cluster Focus
– High Growth
– High Impact
• Talent Development and Promotion
– External Market
– Cluster Focus
– Graduate Retention
– High Demand Occupations
• New Business Formation & Small Business Support
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– Innovation
– Peer Learning

39. So, What Do We Measure?
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40. How do we share?
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41. Greater Richmond Results
• Specific job creation and investment (and more) goals – by
program of work
• Attraction program emphasis on quality vs. quantity
• Invested in web-based CRM, workflow system
• Launched refined collaborative BR&E program
• Launched talent portal – RichmondJobNet.com
• Launched virtual relocation resource –
LoveWhatYouFind.com
• Scorecards developed for management, board and investors
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42. Greater Richmond’s Learnings
“We can’t control the direction of the wind, but we can adjust our sails.”
• Jobs & capital investment still matter
• Link & understand process, output and outcome metrics
• Alignment, accountability and transparency
• Change when conditions change
• Embrace technology
• Explore “link and leverage” strategies
• Focus on conversion
• Transactional vs transformational
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43. Case Study 3: Brenham Economic
Development Foundation
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44. Brenham Challenges
• In the shadow of
Houston and Austin
• Seen as more of a tourism
destination
• Small pool of skilled labor
• Lack of available
commercial buildings
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45. Brenham Goals
• Build awareness with site
selectors
• Familiarization tours with
commercial real estate brokers
• Reach out to existing primary
employers
• Strong workforce development
partnership with local college
and school districts
• A leading website that gets 7,000
+ visits per year
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46. 46

47. Brenham Tactics
• Direct e-mail campaigns INSERT SCREENSHOT OF
• Site visits and windshield SURVEY or SAMPLE EMAIL
tours CAMPAIGNS
• Survey with local primary
employers
• Industry tours and training
programs
• Relevant and updated
website content
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48. Brenham Results
• 66% increase in the number of
conversations
• 100% increase in the number of
proposals submitted
• 50% increase in the number of
ongoing prospects
• Top micropolitan in Texas by Site
Selection magazine for second
year in a row
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49. Brenham Learnings
• Embrace regionalism
• Make yourself known
• Business retention &
expansion is the meat and
potatoes of rural economic
development
• Workforce development is a
major ingredient for success
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50. How can we For information, call:
implement high
performing
marketing programs
in our own
communities? Guillermo Mazier
Business Development,
Atlas Advertising
guillermom@atlas-advertising.com
50 www.twitter.com/atlasad

51. Putting High Performance Into
Practice: The Steps
1. Benchmark your community – get a
baseline.
2. Cut through the clutter: Set goals and
Plan for Performance with your board
and stakeholders.
– Website visits
– Inquiries / Conversations
– Jobs Announced
– Capital Investment Announced
3. Implement the basics, plus additional
tactics that your organization can
support.
4. Adjust to improve your execution.
5. Report out and celebrate your results.
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52. Plan for Performance.
1. Get buy in from your leadership
and stakeholders on a few key goals.
Push hard to track the following:
a. Awareness: Website visits
b. Conversations / inquiry
c. Jobs Announced
d. Capital Investment Announced
2. Set a marketing plan that drives
those goals.
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53. Implement the basics manage,
measure, and produce results.
1. Economic development website, with a content management system to
enable you to make changes
2. A base of content about your area and your organization
3. A customer relationship management system (or Excel spreadsheet to
track inquiries and results)
4. Email marketing management tools, such as Exact Target, Constant
Contact
5. Social media management tools, such as HootSuite, Tweet Deck, etc.
6. Proposal templates and delivery systems (email, online)
7. PowerPoint template for community and company presentations
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54. Basics +1: Tactics that drive awareness
and traffic to your website.
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55. Basics +2: Tactics that convert
website visits to conversations.
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56. Basics +3: Tactics that go straight to
conversations.
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57. Celebrate your success!
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58. Chat your Answer:
What is one thing that you
learned in today’s webinar?
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59. Q+A
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60. Thank You!
Contact information:
1128 Grant Street
Denver, CO 80203
Contact: Ben Wright
t: 303.292.3300 x 210
benw@Atlas-Advertising.com
www.Atlas-Advertising.com
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