Earning Word-of-Mouth Enthusiasm

Accolades are nothing new to Durham including those received by DPAC-the Durham Performing Arts Center.

Similar to Durham’s celebrated restaurants, the Museum of Life & Science, the Carolina Theater, Duke Performances, Durham Bulls, college basketball and football games and many other Durham visitor features and festivals, nearly 70% of the people attending DPAC performances are visitors.

This alone is compelling testimony of the vitality of Durham as a destination, but DPAC is excelling at earning another key tribute and that is the willingness of attendees to recommend the facility to others.

A testament to the great work done by Bob Klaus and his staff at Nederlander/PFM who operate DPAC for the City of Durham and the many volunteers including Durham Wayfinders is the fact that out of 30,580 survey responses by attendees during the 2010-2011 season, nearly 98% will recommend the facility to others and an astonishing 78.4% are extremely likely to do so (click on chart in this blog to enlarge for more detail.)

It is one thing for a community and its collective assets, spearheaded by its community/destination marketing organization, to get on the list for consideration and then draw visitors but it is quite another to fulfill or exceed the expectations necessary to generate word-of-mouth marketing and enthusiasm.

DPAC is doing both and the secret, in the words of general manager Bob Klaus, is “…friendly and passionate people who revel in helping people,” which just happens to reflect two of the multiple values inherent in Durham’s overarching personality as encompased by the community’s brand signature, “Durham – Where Great Things Happen.”