Stillwater third best in U.S. for seeing fall colors

According to Travel & Leisure Magazine, Stillwater is one of the best towns in the U.S. for leaf peeping.

The magazine recently ranked the St. Croix River Valley third among the Top 20 "America's Best Towns for Fall Colors." Only Oakland, Md., and Lake Placid, N.Y., ranked higher in the magazine's September issue.

Travel & Leisure staff notified Stillwater Convention & Visitors Bureau officials a few weeks ago that Stillwater was in the running and let them know the final results on Friday.

"This is a really big deal," said Barb Trueman, a spokeswoman for the bureau. "Anytime we are awarded with something, it just helps us get people excited about coming to the Birthplace of Minnesota."

Trueman said this year should be a particularly good fall for leaf peeping.

"It looks like we are going to have a little earlier fall," she said. "We usually recommend that people plan a trip to Stillwater (for fall colors) sometime the last week of September and first week of October, but this year, it might even come earlier."

The best way to view fall colors? Take a boat cruise up the St. Croix River, Trueman said.

"They can see the cliffs and see even more color that way," she said.

Source: http://www.twincities.com

The Hidden Contract

The executive tosses and turns in his sleep. He's having a nightmare. In his dream, his board of directors comes to him with the news: Sales are tanking. You've signed an important contract. You MUST deliver on that contract. ARE you delivering on that contract? WHO wrote the contract? WHO signed the contract? WHAT'S in the contract WHY aren't we fulfilling the contract.WHAT are you going to do about it? Of course, because this is a nightmare, the executive has no answers. He doesn't know about the contract either. No one in his company knows about the contract. He's furious, but helpless. He doesn't know how to fix the problem, and his company is in jeopardy.

Fiction? Of course. Fact? Absolutely.

I call this the hidden contract. It's your brand. Your brand is the contract your customers create with your company. Yes, you heard right. It's YOUR brand, but THEIR contract. It's their set of emotions, expectations, needs, egos, aspirations, affinities, beliefs and loyalties that customers create and carry in their minds when they choose to buy your product or services. Your customers write the contract The contract is housed in their head. As long as you fulfill their list of expectations, they keep coming back. If you stop delivering on all or most of them, they choose to go to a competitor.

Thus, the earmark of a brand: It exists in the mind of your customers and it is emotionally charged. So when you consider developing, codifying, launching or repositioning your brand, it's imperative you start with research to learn specifically what they are thinking and feeling... about you. Otherwise, you won't know what's in the contract. If you have success, you won't know what you did right (so you can repeat it.) If you fail, you'll never know where you broke the promise - and that's a waking nightmare!

Strong research should inform every step of the brand development process, and strong research should support the ongoing management of a brand. The intimate knowledge of what your customers think about you and your competitors provides a platform for a strategic brand. You'll have a brand that will drive awareness, increase leads, push sales, increase market share, put you at the top of the consideration set, and create a price premium. All the things that CEOs care about.

But, there can be no strategic brand without knowing first what's in the hidden contract.