Marketing Management Picasso’s Guernica: The Strength of an Art Brand in Destination e-Branding Beatriz Plaza, Silke N. Haarich, Courtney M. Waldron Introduction This study addresses the challenge of analyz- ing and monitoring brand effectiveness. It adopts laces, and their corresponding public a practical approach to identifying and measuring authorities, increasingly perceive branding the impact of a given art brand on tourist flows. Pas a powerful tool for raising visibility. This The focus is the number of visitors to Gernika, in turn attracts tourism, investment, and company a tourist destination in the Basque Country in relocation and thus enhances the cultural profile northern Spain, and related appearances of the of the place (Kotler et al., 1999). From local devel- destination (and its key associations) in the online opment to marketing strategies and tourism, place news media. Pablo Picasso’s 1937 masterpiece Beatriz Plaza is an econom- branding is increasingly being applied in a range Guernica has brought the small Basque town ics professor at the University of contexts. Within these contexts, art is often unusual fame. The painting exerts an important of the Basque Country. She holds an MBA from the IESE recognized for its function in branding. While influence on the number of visitors to Gernika. art has cultural value in itself, its representational Business School and a PhD in This study examines the news items that Google Urban and Regional and interpretable nature makes it a natural brand News offers for the town of Gernika and the asset. However, the strategic management of Economics from the Guernica artwork (which adopts the Spanish University of the Basque brand assets faces many operative hurdles before spelling of the Basque town) and the impact of Country. Her research inter- it can become an effective local development tool. these news items on tourist numbers. As the ests include cultural branding In line with more widespread product branding, artwork hangs in the Reina Sofia Museum in and urban development. one of the most difficult tasks is the measurement Madrid, 500 kilometres from Gernika, the case and monitoring of brand impact. Silke N. Haarich practises as creates a laboratory with favourable conditions a consultant on regional New digital media offer fresh opportunities for isolating the influence of the media (about development policies. She for evaluating brand value. The media play a key Guernica) in attracting visitors to Gernika, since holds a PhD in Economics tourists do not travel to the town to see the actual and a master’s degree in role in shaping place identity and image, and in Spatial Planning (Dortmund, communicating place-associated traits (both artwork. Of course, brand equity – the accumu- lated strength of a brand – comprises many ele- Germany) and has extensive positive and negative) to consumers (Currid and experience in the field of Williams, 2009; Hausmann, 2012). A significant ments: association, awareness, perceived quality, urban regeneration through part of a place’s visibility and brand is channelled customer loyalty and meaning (Aaker, 1996). arts and culture. through the media, from newspaper articles to The measure of brand impact, then, is really a photographs. Online tools that have been devel- measure of the impact of the town’s brand associa- Courtney M. Waldron tion with the painting, which is made visible holds a BA in Economics from oped over the past decade make possible the the University of Nevada Las measurement of this visibility, in terms of the through the online media (also part of brand Vegas. She is a visiting amount of media devoted to a particular place. awareness). In other words, the study addresses researcher at the University of We are able to evaluate how people “see” a place the following question: How much tourism, if the Basque Country under a or its cultural associations before physically inter- any, can be attributed to the brand association of Fulbright Student Research acting with a place. Guernica made visible through the online media? grant. Volume 15, NUMBeR 3 • SpRiNg 2013 53 The methodological interest of this article 2009; Rainisto, 2003), at the same time high- lies in the experiment carried out using Google lighting the difficulties inherent in influencing Acknowledgements News and the subsequent quantification of the and managing the process from within. This work draws on impact of online media branding on the number research carried out of visitors and their spending in a given tourist Although place branding is not a new concept, by the Art4pax destination. The article first provides an intro- branding strategies have gained in popularity Foundation for duction to the research field of place branding over the last two decades as the need for distinc- the Gernika town and the role that art can play in branding. It tion and visibility has increased. This need has council in 2009. then introduces the case of Gernika and Picasso’s arisen from fierce competition in the face of renowned painting Guernica. During the Spanish globalization: the increased mobility of people, Civil War, Nazi bombers launched the first-ever goods, and information and the expanding bor- saturation-bombing raid against the civilian ders (or lack thereof) of business location. population of Gernika at the request of General Modern digital media posit people and entities Francisco Franco, inspiring the theme of Picasso’s as “seen” by wider audiences while at the same work. The article next presents the research time risking invisibility amidst an excess of infor- objectives and methodology as well as the results mation. Thus the typical targets for place brand- of the study analyzing the link between appear- ing strategies are business visitors and tourists, ances of Gernika and Guernica on the Web and residents and skilled workers, business and indus- the economic impact of visitors to the town. It trial investment, and export markets (Kotler et finally offers conclusions and recommendations al., 1999). Effective place or destination branding for future research. requires strategic and operational ability and skills. Equally, place branding strategies involve the generation of brand equity, including a brand identity and a brand image, and proper com- Art in Place Branding: Identifying munication of the brand image (Rainisto, 2003). Cultural Destinations Culture, and art in particular, can have com- pelling functions in branding. Like a brand, art Place Branding Practices and Art in Branding is representational (Schroeder, 2005) and can add value to businesses and regional economies Place branding is currently seen as an important (McNicholas, 2004). Culture and brands are element in place development. Within the general semiotic constructs that signal a spectrum of framework of place marketing, the branding of meaning. For example, the “Mac” brand not places, cities or countries is a crucial instrument only signifies a line of technology products but for increasing internal and external attractiveness also represents innovation and a corporate phi- in the realm of global competition. Many authors losophy. Similarly, the Sydney Opera House have cited the importance of branding as a mar- draws associations with the high-culture opera, keting strategy applied to places (Anholt, 2005; dance and music companies that perform at the Ashworth and Page, 2011; Hospers, 2011; venue while also serving as a place icon for Kavaratzis and Ashworth, 2005; Kotler et al., Australia (Colbert, 2003). Art museums and 1999; Kotler and Gertner, 2002; Pike, 2002, even individual artworks can represent specific A b stra c T Places and their public authorities increasingly perceive art branding as a tool for raising place visibility, attracting investment and tourism, and enhancing their cultural profiles. Online news aggregators offer new potential for measuring the degree to which places associated with art are “seen” in the media. The authors design and test a method for evaluating the effectiveness of art brand association and awareness in place marketing. The work draws upon a case study of Gernika, a town made famous by Picasso’s 1937 painting Guernica. The masterpiece hangs in the Reina Sofia Museum in Madrid, 500 kilometres from Gernika, yet influ- ences the number of visitors to the town. Thus Gernika is a useful laboratory for testing an art brand’s impact on visitors because Guernica is not nearby to influence the data. The approach developed may also be used to help determine the value of advertising in the online media. KEYWORDS Art-led place branding, art brand, brand awareness, place marketing, brand associations, monitoring tools 54 InternatioNal journal of aRtS maNagemeNt artistic styles and a broader sense of history, • local products and specialties (Bordeaux and prestige and creativity (Caldwell, 2000). Brands wine; Gouda and cheese; Parma and ham) and culture are “representational texts” (O’Reilly, 2007). While the reading of these texts depends • high-impact transportation, research and in part on how their producers create them, knowledge infrastructure (Trans-Siberian meaning also depends on how consumers receive Railway and Russia; MIT and Boston; CERN and interact with them. Meaning is constantly and Geneva) reworked through social and cognitive processes (Potts et al., 2008). This diversity, or “multivo- These spaces, goods and events can bring cacity,” of meaning allows a brand to resonate economic, social and cultural value to places. with a broader audience, heightening its visibility An effective branding strategy simply adds to and increasing its value. To be sure, art has that value, by increasing the visibility of a place cultural value in itself and is most often created and generating further economic activity. for purposes beyond branding. This article sim- ply points out that, because of its representa- This article draws upon a case study of brand tional nature, art is easily incorporated into association. Brands can increase place visibility branding strategies, if not a natural brand creator by associating localities with well-known per- itself.