Strategically Marketing Florida’s Cities: An Exploratory Study Into How Cities Engage in Public Marketing

Abstract

Over the course of this decade, Florida has emerged as one of America’s fastest growing and most visited states. As many of the state’s municipalities compete for opportunities to expand their tax base and achieve other municipally centered goals, they are faced with the challenge of needing to strategically differentiate themselves from their peers to attract opportunities. One way to accomplish this is through using marketing as a tool of strategic management. While literature shows that marketing engagement is happening in cities throughout the world, we lack a clear understanding of what American municipalities are doing about marketing and why they are increasingly choosing to participate in the activity. This work provides a glimpse into how a sample of Florida cities are strategically using marketing and what city managers and communication officials are specifically hoping to accomplish with marketing activity. The purpose of this research is to answer the following three questions: Why do city governments engage in marketing? Do city government officials engage in marketing from a strategic management perspective? How do city governments engage in marketing? Utilizing surveys and interviews from city managers and communication officials at the municipal level from across the state, this exploratory study sheds a light onto how several cities using marketing as a strategic management tool to achieve articulated goals. We provide recommendations for practitioners exploring strategic use of marketing and practitioners seeking to expand marketing engagement within their municipalities.

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“…The concept of public value is linked with strategic management. Bryson's (2011) definition supports Moore's (1995, 2013) work that strategic management is a mechanism to achieve public value and that governments are in a better position to address any concerns associated with a public value (such as a lack of public input) is strategic management is in place (Thomas et al, 2020). Hereźniak and Anders‐Morawska (2021, pp.…”

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“…In this process, communication is essential, seeking to remain closer and accessible to stakeholders (Cezar, 2019;Pasquier & Villeneuve, 2018;Ribeiro & Oliveira, 2013). Media evolution is one of the factors underlying organizations' trend to communicate more and more (Pasquier & Villeneuve, 2018;Thomas et al, 2020), which enables the development of marketing strategies through the dissemination of information and message projection. As a result, it encourages society to participate in political life and related matters (Cezar, 2018), as well as to achieve other goals, including, but not limited to, gaining trust and improving public image (Thomas et al, 2020;Zavattaro et al, 2021).…”

“…In recent years, when social media emerged as ubiquitous, governments have increasingly used different methods to convey their message (Thomas et al, 2020), allowing public communication to take on different levels (Pasquier & Villeneuve, 2018), among which stand out institutional communication and government communication. In general, communication has promoted public organizations, in order to facilitate access to their services or strengthen their legitimacy (Pasquier & Villeneuve, 2018;Rossoni, 2016).…”

“…To do that, their main strategic ally is communication with the public, considered in the literature as the greatest potential of marketing for public administration (Kaplan & Haenlein, 2009;Zavattaro et al, 2021). For this reason, official organizations launch in their communication channels several marketing strategies to indicate trust in their public policies (Thomas et al, 2020).…”

“…The way communication is conceived in digital media can increase the performance and the perception of brand value and the public service offered (Thomas, Fay, & Berry, 2020), allowing the management of image and reputation to facilitate achieving public sector's goals (Pasquier & Villeneuve, 2018;Zavattaro et al, 2021). Public marketing can even be associated with public brands, which represent consumers' (here citizens) perceptions and feelings about a particular product (or public solution), thus establishing a relationship among the citizen, the product offered and the organization (Kotler & Armstrong, 2015).…”