Jay Baer, American marketing consultant, speaker and author of New York Times bestselling book “Youtility: Why Smart Marketing is About Help Not Hype,” once said, “Make your marketing so useful people would pay for it.”
Billions in combined revenue for products like Gatorade, Sentricon®, and Trusopt® demonstrate that across the world, consumers and business decision-makers have been convinced for decades that Gainesville-grown technology and inventions are worth paying for. The problem is that most consumers and business decision-makers don’t know those innovations have Gainesville roots. In fact, they often are not familiar with Gainesville at all.
The Gainesville Area Chamber of Commerce’s Council for Economic Outreach is working to counter that problem via a new economic development marketing campaign called “We Question Everything.” As a component of the Council’s Transforming Greater Gainesville Five-Year Economic Development strategy, the We Question Everything marketing campaign is designed to leverage multimedia to tell the story of innovative solutions from Gainesville. Some of these solutions have resulted in products that have realized national or global commercial success. Others are already providing, or could result in, solutions with the potential to improve lives worldwide.
The goal of the campaign is to compel site selectors, business leaders, and workers in key industries to associate innovation with Gainesville and to give us a strong starting point for conversations with them about how we are positioned to take their companies to the next level. Ultimately, we want the stories we tell to be compelling enough to make them want to relocate here and become part of Gainesville’s innovation ecosystem.
For instance, sharing with the owners of the 1.5 million homes across the United States that have been treated with Sentricon that Gainesville — specifically, the University of Florida — solved their termite problems would create that association. Telling them that Sentricon also protects the Statue of Liberty and the White House from termites would make the story even more compelling. And, if that individual happens to be a decision-maker, Sentricon’s story creates a natural segue into all of the ways that Gainesville is answering big questions, saving companies money and providing collaborative research opportunities unparalleled in the Southeastern U.S.
Other inspired questions answered in Gainesville have led to game-changing solutions. For example, Trusopt, a drug used to treat glaucoma, was developed at UF. For years, it produced royalties that added up to a third of the university’s revenue. Today, AGTC — incubated at UF’s Sid Martin Biotechnology Incubator — is developing cures for rare lung and eye diseases, offering hope to patients with unmet medical needs. Further, many more groundbreaking Gainesville innovations are also in the pipeline. For example, researchers at UF are getting closer to developing ways to reverse brain damage, vaccinate against diabetes and defend computers from cyberattacks.
For site selectors and business decision-makers, these solutions provide a ready answer to the question, “Why Gainesville?” by illustrating the endless possibilities for innovation, public-private partnerships and talent in our region. Our region’s capacity for research excellence and business growth — combined with our excellent quality of life — makes us highly marketable as a business and lifestyle destination as well as a strong competitor for the 750,000 location decisions made globally each year.
Stay tuned this year as the We Question Everything campaign leverages our rich history of innovation to introduce Gainesville to the global business community as a proven creator of marketable, life-changing solutions.