MRG Evening Meeting – Putting Geography On The Map – Is Locality Still Important In Targeting?
In the age of virtual villages, teleshopping and a supposed freedom of mobility it has been argued that the fabric of traditional communities is wearing thin. As people leave the High Street for out of town supermarkets and others spend more and more time on the internet (this is probably being read on the Net right now) so local and regional bonds are weakened.
This is the scenario presented at the beginning of the MRG Evening Meeting on 27 January 1999 by Julian Tooke, associated director at BMRB. Tooke’s “prosecution” centred around the premiss that the disintegration of communities means that targeting the local in marketing and advertising is not really worthwhile – we are all one homogenised mass, so the argument goes. To back this up he cited the breakdown in the family unit, the growth of single person households (up 28% between 1990 and 1998 according to TGI data) and the growth of the internet.
He argued that local links are often forged through the workplace, but that there has been a significant rise in the number of part-time workers and teleworkers. Teleworkers, for example, are not tied to any specific geographic location and so their work does not directly relate to the community. The internet is also fast-removing the need to conduct business locally, along with the rise in popularity of telephone banking and out of town shopping.
At this point Jenny Drury of Midland Independent Newspapers (MIN) stepped up to the defence of the regional community and its place in the marketing mix. She referred to research by the Henley Centre which found that understanding local consumer markets is the key to finding difference. Drury said that the majority of us do still live our lives locally and that locality significantly influences our purchasing decisions.
The Newspaper Society’s Business Choice survey also found that most businesses still run their lives locally and that three in four business people live within ten miles of their work. There is, says Drury, something of a ‘mobility myth’, claiming that most people do not drive miles in their cars to get to work. Only the very skilled sector of the working community moves around the country – the mass stays fairly localised according to more Henley Centre research. She also claimed that local shopping is currently enjoying something of a renaissance.
MIN research has shown that a number of significant factors vary substantially across the country: average income, social structures/attitudes and outlook (optimism, for example) all differ across the country’s regions. The Midlands cannot be treated as one area in these terms: there are wide variations between, for example, Rugby and Warwick.
To back this up Julian Tooke explained how when CDs were introduced in the ’80s, the takeup rate differed across the nation. This is something which could have been capitalised on by marketers and advertisers, he suggests. There are strong correlations between regionality and attitudes: London was found to be very cosmopolitan in outlook, whereas the South West was described by Tooke as less faddish. This means that different kinds of advertising messages will appeal to different regions of Britain.
A resurgence in regionalism and community was also highlighted at the meeting. Devolution has had, and will continue to have, some effect on this. Research by BMRB found that 37% of people feel more a part of a community than they did ten years ago. Advertisers and retailers are beginning to realise this, says Drury. Tesco, for example, is opening smaller, fresh food outlets called Tesco Metro which have a more local feel; Esso’s petrol prices are adjusted according to the area of the station.
The strength of the local media, as evidenced by the current growth of regional newspapers and local radio licences, proves that local communities are not dead, according to Drury. This means that local media can be used to capitalise on, and associate brand values with, regional attitudes. In essence, locality does still matter.