SK+G
Vegas has expanded as a destination- travel market by offering much more in the way of experiences. Macau will probably get to that degree in time, but right now it’s primarily the focus of a burgeoning new market that is catering pretty exclusively to the gambler with all the ancillary services as secondary. It’s a matter of degree. In essence you
are trying to attract somebody’s attention; we’re storytellers. We’re trying to create an experience for the customer based on where their motivations lie. So the learnings from Las Vegas are totally relevant but with a slightly different
the consumer on holiday or travelling for a break, and that may be true of the average visitor or the person here for a convention, or to gamble. One thing they have in common though is that Vegas is a melting pot; there is something here for everyone. The high roller seeking a luxurious experience, comes in a private jet, stays in a lavish villa, to the average person that’s part of a tour group that’s here for three or four days looking for a good time – and everyone in between. There’s a lot you can learn from that confluence of humanity, and how to appeal to all of those groups.
On the other hand, there is another learning that
comes from this city; while the creation of brand and understanding a demographic is very important, this is a market that turns over every couple of days. It changes every single day; the need to create experiences, and to address the needs of an ever- changing, constantly fluid market, is quite intense. As an agency we have the ability to do work and messaging that drives brand awareness and drives that experiential side of someone’s travel experience, but also we to do tactical work because we have to drive revenue for our clients. We know they have to put heads in beds and butts on seats, and we have to turn business on a daily basis. It’s a dynamic and intense marketplace, and a lot of our clients outside the market recognise the tenacity and intensity that we function with as a company.
CI: Vegas is quite unique in a lot of ways, but
notably, unlike another visitor attraction like, say, Disney World, people come to Vegas for a lot of different reasons – exhibitions, gaming, tourism. At Disney World, people go for one reason; with this in mind, can you apply the lessons you have learned in Las Vegas to, say, a Macanese casino, where the visitors will be 99.9% Chinese, and are there for one reason only? JS: Interestingly, yes, I think they are. Human
behaviour is pretty consistent; you may find that in Macau a customer is focussed on things slightly differently, that the gaming component of the experience might be more at the forefront for their customers over what it is in Las Vegas. That’s been a shift, as 20 years ago 75% of total revenue in Vegas came from gaming, that’s down to about 45% now.
skew. We have clients that are non-gaming, that are in hospitality or the restaurants business, it’s a matter of applying the luxury and lifestyle component and what we know to be true for those audiences.
CI: How did you end up working with Galaxy Macau? JS: We’ve been fortunate that our work and
reputation has driven a good portion of our business development, so people do tend to seek us out. With Galaxy, we had a great relationship with their CEO who came from Vegas; we worked with him on the Planet Hollywood brand that we helped reposition and relaunch here on the Strip. The success of that work and that relationship led us to Galaxy when he moved to a new
position. It’s a
testament to what I’ve been saying that we have been able to cross cultural boundaries
with the same sort of understanding of human behaviour and what motivates people in this vertical; the same is true for Solaire which is a brand we launched in March in Manila. We have had to learn Philippine culture and understand what motivates that audience. We’re launching a huge property in the Bahamas, Baha Mar, in December 2014, which is a $3.5bn resort which will cater largely to a US audience but there is a lot about the Bahamas that is quite unique and that we have had to entrench ourselves in. It’s all about insight, learnings and cultural sensitivity – about creating experiences based on what the end user wants.
JUNE 2013 45
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