Product Branding Las Vegas Style Las Vegas is one of the nation’s favorite points of interest for vacationing. It’s a 24-hour/ 365 day a year city where anything is possible. With Las Vegas being a loved past-time and where dreams of striking it rich can came true, there is another side that no one bothers to mention, the reality side. Las Vegas has many attractions and more casinos than any other place in the world. They offer entertainment for the whole family, unique marriages, and most recently plenty of activities for children.
Which means that companies must position themselves to be continuously communicative to their potential consumers, including the kids (Kotler, 2010, p. 210). Which also leads me to think that Las Vegas has came up with a new target market. Whereas Vegas’ theme use to be “What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas”; it is more catching for them to now advertise “We Do It All In Vegas”. In the early 70’s there was not a need to advertise as much as now because back then Vegas was for the rich and famous.
Now since everyone especially this new generation goes there to gamble, the need to target more single people ages 18-35 are on the rise. Marketers figure that these young people have plenty of money (access to it) and they are willing to do everything in their power to get it. This target market was most likely selected for two main reasons. The first is because of the enormous profits to be gained from this particular group and the second is because of this group s lack of education and low self-regard.
Nevertheless, if I were ever targeted by a business, it would be highly resourceful for that business to utilize the data of systems such as the Values and Lifestyles questionnaire to ensure a highly profitable venture. The use of advertising by branding today is a essential part to the relationship between businesses and consumers. Companies that know why their customers act the way they do can gear their advertising accordingly and thus gain a competitive edge. (Kotler, 2010. p160).
Public and personal branding has a lot to do with the fact that teenagers (more so than adults) are affected by Vegas’ marketing and advertising. Vegas uses branding extensively in their marketing program. Teenagers are more influenced by this marketing program because they brand name much more than adults. Where an adult would buy an article of clothing from the American Eagle for its quality a teenager would be more influenced if the article of clothing was more trend savvy.
Vegas is aware that they are influenced and target them in their advertisements. This is a very smart marketing. Also the use of public amenities such as benches in parks, sides of taxi cabs and of course billboards are a necessity. A popular technique businesses use to conduct research on customers is through the Values and Lifestyles (VALS) system. VALS categorizes U. S. adult consumers into mutually exclusive groups based on their psychology and several key demographics.
VALS is said to be unique because it highlights factors that motivate consumer buying behavior, according to the Business Intelligence Center. Unlike other segmentation systems that are based solely on demographics, VALS goes a step beyond by looking at the underlying psychological make-up of the public. (Keller, 2008, p. 130). Now the question can be asked “what are they buying? ” After a long day of exploring the diverse offerings of Las Vegas, it can be said that the consumers are really buying into guaranteed fun, riches, and the idea of living the American Dream.
The 1999 Americans Greatest Vacation Spots says, in 1997, Las Vegas attracted an estimated 31 million visitors, up more than 5 percent from 1996 and figure that just seems to keep growing. In an effort to tap into the means of disposable income that goes unspent every year by members of the so-called Generation X and Generation Y, the City of Las Vegas Tourism Board is unveiling a new marketing strategy to replace “What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas”. The new strategy is simply called, “Just Give Us Your Damn Money. , Once it has came to realization, the need to increase advertisement they decided to extend their product line by creating a “Virtual Vegas. ” With hotels filled to capacity, the continued growth in and around Las Vegas seems to be unlimited. So with this Virtual Vegas, consumers Las Vegas experience without leaving their homes and it also shows a different feature of the actual product. The quality of service is a little different but the brand named items and packaging (along with prices) still were the same. 2005, Vol. 2). With this new line of service, the need to sell the products effectively they must take into consideration the effect that the packaging should have on the customers and the way in which displays of this particular product are arranged. A good idea would be to have their town covered with riches on the cover or something similar to encourage people to look and to buy the product and not be considered with the price of the product. (Kotler, 2010, p. 191).
The marketers have generated a newsletter that they also use to target potential vacationers, with emphasizing the choice to come to Vegas or Stay at home with Virtual Vegas. Overall it can be said that Las Vegas’ product brand is an existing one, with line extension, public and personal branding the possibilities are endless. They utilize many multi-brands with the hotels and casinos being in the same package. Yet there are many different forms of market branding that I did not cover the need for Vegas to continue with their arrogant but yet persuasive advertisement is essential to the growth of their industry.
I feel that this would be beneficial for them because even with the economy the way it is, there are still people out there who have riches and are captivated with the whole idea of “What Goes On In Vegas, Stays In Vegas”. References Keller, Lane. ,(2008). Strategic Brand Management (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall,) Chapter 10. Kotler, A. & Armstrong, G. ,(2010). Principles of Marketing 13th Edition (Pearson) Ch. 8-11. www. vegas. com/advertisements www. visitlasvegas. com
