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Canadian marketers often scratch their heads over the challenges posed by the culture of Quebec and the difficulties of adjusting programs to work there.

In doing so, they often overlook similar, though less obvious, problems in marketing in the Atlantic provinces.

Such an oversight is understandable.

Combined, the four provinces of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland, make up only about 8% of Canada’s population, and have a notably smaller average income.

The geography of the Atlantic provinces is also a problem; being on the other side of Quebec makes them less accessible, and, frankly, easy to forget.

Nevertheless, to ignore 2.4 million people is folly for any Canadian marketer, particularly when just a little cultural education can significantly improve one’s success in the Atlantic provinces.

Atlantic Canadians, in part because of television, are more like the rest of Canada than ever before. People on the streets of Fredericton and Charlotteown can look much like those on the streets of Toronto or Edmonton.

The differences are subtle, but notable.

There is truth in the stereotype of Atlantic Canadians being more traditional, more family-oriented, and more interested in humor. It’s just as true that they are less wealthy, and have a higher illiteracy rate.

‘There’s quite a different psyche, quite a different attitude, and quite a different set of expectations,’ says Noel O’Dea, president of Target Marketing & Communications, in St. John’s, Nfld.

O’Dea says that outside of Halifax and Saint John, n.b. two of the larger cities in the region, there are similarities between the population of the Atlantic provinces and that of rural Quebec.

‘I think people’s expectations about life, expectations about products, and expectations about their relationships with products, are different than in mainstream Canada,’ he says.

O’Dea, whose company has been involved in qualitative and quantitative research in Atlantic Canada and all over North America, goes on to describe the region as one with a certain homogenity of ideas, and a strong regional identity that can be leveraged by smart marketers.

‘Within Newfoundland, and all of Atlantic Canada, people tend to be less cynical, more trusting, more sheltered, more cohesive – people look at the positive side of things.’

As an example of a marketer who recognizes that difference, O’Dea cites Target client Carnation Evaporated Milk, a product of Nestle Canada.

Because half of Canada’s evaporated milk is sold in Atlantic Canada, the relationship these customers have with the brand is of paramount importance, and qualitative information is essential.

‘The heavy user of Carnation Evaporated milk has a very different psychological profile than the demographics would allow you to believe,’ O’Dea says.

Recognizing the importance of this market, Nestle used Target to get a better understanding of its customers, and, as a result, the brand is positioned differently and marketed differently in Atlantic Canada than in the rest of the country, putting more emphasis on consumers’ emotional bond with the product.

According to O’Dea, the brand is being promoted through non-traditional media such as festival sponsorship, and the shop makes an effort to put an Atlantic face on the brand by creating an association with the people, the language, accents, background, types of recipes, and the product’s uses.

‘That is the kind of intimacy you get from living here and having the cumulative effect of researching and talking to people for all different types of clients,’ O’Dea says.

‘It’s very difficult for a national agency [from Toronto] to get that insight,’ he says.

‘Not because the national agencies are not smart, but because they haven’t had these people as neighbors.

Another consideration is that sometimes the same rules simply do not apply in the Atlantic provinces that do in the rest of Canada.

In choosing media for a campaign, it is important to know that in many areas billboards are not available or permitted, either in high concentrations, or at all.

Because of this, Target, in promoting the Marine Atlantic ferry service from New Brunswick to Nova Scotia, and from Nova Scotia to Maine, had to build a number of billboards as well as employ transport truck tractor trailers to secure a presence along the highway.

Billboard-size (10 feet by 48 feet) advertisements for the service were mounted on the sides of the trailers that were parked in strategic locations along routes frequented by tourists.

The ridership on the boats has increased by 16% and 24%, respectively, since the advertising began.

Rick Emberley, chairman of Bristol Communications, in Halifax, is careful to point out that while some of the specifics of a marketing campaign can be different in the Atlantic provinces, the processes one goes through are essentially the same as anywhere else in the country, or in all of North America for that matter.

‘The so-called uniqueness that exists on a cultural level is certainly something marketers deal with, but, frankly, in the overall scheme of things, that’s probably the most manageable of things marketers are dealing with here right now,’ Emberley says.

He says it is important to note that in most sectors the Atlantic provinces are almost overserved, and that competition is stiff.

‘The food retail business, for instance, is incredibly competitive, and the result is some of the lowest food basket prices in the country.

‘Most consumer product categories are very competitive. Even professional business services.’

Also, because there is a relatively small population distributed over a relatively large area, the costs of providing goods and services to the Atlantic marketplace is relatively expensive.

The net result is that the margin in most categories is relatively tight.

As far as the consumers are concerned, Emberley thinks differences are not significantly greater than those between most regions, but he does comment that Atlantic Canadians in general are ‘by nature, more conservative consumers; not prone to flights of fancy.

‘That tends very often to get reflected in marketing messages,’ he says.

‘The other thing is that there’s such a strong affinity to music and humor across much of that region that finds its way into a significant amount of the marketing communications.’

Emberley says a recent ad campaign for Newfoundland Telephone leveraged the sharp Newfoundland sense of humor in spots that poked fun at the competing long-distance suppliers.

‘It’s a humor-driven piece with a lot of tongue in cheek,’ Emberley says. ‘It’s very local in its message.

‘It’s a departure from the straightforward highly competitive messages that are taking place in that whole telecommunciations sector at the moment.

‘I’m not sure it could find its way into many other markets, and be successful.’

David Hawkins, president of Hawk Communications, headquartered in Sackville, n.b., says there is ‘no question’ of the distinctiveness of consumers in the Atlantic Region.

‘You have to look at the particular set of circumstances, but, indeed, there is a flavor to life here that is particularly different, so, for some marketers, depending on the nature of the product or service they are offering, it would be helpful to be sensitive to that,’ Hawkins says.

He commends Target for its campaign for Air Nova, the regional subsidiary of Air Cananda.

He says that it would have been no surprise if the marketers involved took a ‘head office approach,’ but they succeeded in ‘putting a real Atlantic spin’ on the advertising, and, as a result, the little airline has thrived.

Sometimes, Hawkins says, the campaigns have to do more than simply play on the emotional side of being an Atalntic Canadian, and the focus has to be more on practical considerations.

Snowmobiles, for instance, are incredibly popular in Newfoundland, but their success has less to do with their recreational value than their utility.

Hawk recognized that the sporty snowmobile advertising used in most of the rest of the country might work to a limited extent in Newfoundland, but it was not likely the most effective strategy for its client – Arctic Cat.

Hawk went ahead with a campaign that reflected the Arctic Cat snowmobiles as more akin to pickup trucks and tractors, than racing motorcycles.

‘If we hadn’t done that, we probably would have been successful, but probably nowhere near as successful,’ he says.

Hawkins says sometimes the difference between advertising created in central Canada and that produced in Atlantic Canada, has the same foreign feel to it as American advertising seen in Canada.

‘The fashions, and the look of the people, and the styles, and when you look at broadcast campaigns, the use of language and music in particular – it just doesn’t fit,’ he says.

‘I don’t mean this in a perjorative sense, but all of Canada is a series of parochial markets, certainly Atlantic Canada, as well.

‘They’re very localized in their concerns and the way they see themselves.’

Hawkins says he has seen a number of marketers coming into Atlantic Canada with advertising showing a typical Ontario man or woman.

That shopper is simply not typical of Atlantic Canada. While, of course, Atlantic Canadians like to see a good image of themselves, they are not likely to be dressed up and driving a fancy car to get the groceries.

An issue of particular significance in New Brunswick, where about one-third of the population are of Acadian ancestry, is that the French spoken there is quite different than the French spoken in Quebec.

Hawkins makes the point that while most Acadians would prefer to have advertising speak to them in Quebec French than in English, their first preference would be Acadian French. To ignore that, he says, is to ‘miss an opportunity.’