Struggling with low footfall and a lack of energy, I was initially brought in to provide a fresh pair of eyes on the Dock’s leisure, tourism and marketing offer in 2005. Working with the team at the Dock, RBA has developed it significantly as a visitor attraction and it’s now the north west’s most-visited free attraction. My role has evolved recently into developing a strategy to celebrate the Dock’s 175th anniversary in 2021, including the project to seal its royal status, which it was awarded in late 2018.
Over the past 12 years I’ve worked on various stages of the Dock’s development. Initially I fo-cused on its identity, creating a marketing and PR strategy and action plan. Concentrating on what worked at the Dock we repositioned the estate around tourism and leisure, working with tenants, stakeholders and partners including Marketing Liverpool, ACC Liverpool and Liverpool One.
We’ve delivered a full marketing and communications strategy, building an events programme alongside a friendly consumer campaign, PR and marketing tactics for multiple audiences. We’ve worked with tenants to gain their commitment and cooperation, helping them work together as a team and creating a forum for their ideas to maintain that momentum and position.
We pay attention to the details: how the Dock looks; how it delivers and the events it puts on. Footfall during that period has risen to 5.67m annually, and our focus now is on the Dock’s 175 anniversary in 2021.
Rachael has the implicit trust of all of the tenants to do what’s best for the Dock. She’s worked tirelessly with both tenants and landowners to increase footfall and revenues.