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Site selectors and businesses do not arrive at your website hoping to wade through a deluge of raw data. They are looking for a clear answer to a simple question: why does this location make sense for our next expansion or investment?
Yet the familiar temptation is to make a community website – or its newly minted data portal – look authoritative by filling it with charts, statistics and maps. More data, however, does not always mean better results.
In economic development, indiscriminate publishing can quietly work against a community’s objectives, particularly when the aim is to attract business and investment.
When a website or microsite buries that story under a mountain of figures, coherence suffers. Worse, some of that data may unintentionally highlight weaknesses rather than strengths – sending would-be investors away instead of drawing them in.
The crucial distinction is internal vs external data use. Internally, robust datasets are gold for analysis, responding to information requests, content preparation and stakeholder discussions. But outward-facing, they must be curated with intent.
A website – whether main hub or branded portal – is a marketing tool, not a public data warehouse. Its role is to create intrigue, inspire confidence, and prompt that vital next step:contact. Only then is the time right to share all the granular details a diligent prospect requests.
A successful economic development website or microsite places narrative and positioning ahead of completeness.The numbers presented should reinforce the community’s value proposition, not distract or discourage. The best sites act as a filter: data is chosen, shaped, and presented to promote a singular message. More data, left unchecked, is not a strategy; only meaningful data – curated for purpose and story – can spur genuine interest and engagement.
In sum, economic developers should resist the urge to treat data as wallpaper, whether on a website or microsite.The goal is not generosity, but judicious storytelling. More is better – for internal purposes. But for marketing, less, curated with purpose, is masterstroke.
Dave Parsell is CEO of Localintel, TEDx speaker and spent 15 years working in economic development.
