Smile Dexter! You’re On YouTube Now

The City of Dexter recently launched its own YouTube Channel.

It’s a cart before the horse story and that’s good in this case, as you’ll soon see. Let’s start with the cart.

The City of Dexter receives an annual grant via the Ann Arbor Convention and Visitors Bureau to create projects specifically for the purpose of attracting visitors to the area. A few examples of such projects are the Dexter’s Visitor’s Guide, marketing for the Paint Dexter Plein Air Festival and advertising in the Michigan Trails Magazine.

Last year, grant money was used by the City for the development f two videos marketing the Dexter area to visitors. These videos were designed to complement the Dexter Visitor’s Guide. M-1 Studios created the two videos. M-1 Studios was chosen for their experience creating promotional videos for a number of other similar communities such as Ferndale.

I searched “city of dexter” on YouTube and for some reason a clip from the Cartoon Network came up first. There’s a joke in there somewhere probably.

We’re going to need a bigger cart. While the two promotional videos were under development, The PBS show Under the Radar: Michigan announced plans for two episodes they would  like to do in Dexter. Host Tom Daldin came to Dexter, met with locals, featured Hotel Hickman, Mindo Chocolate, The B2B and The Blast Corn Maze.

Suddenly, Dexter had four videos promoting our fair city with its verdant environs to the world at large. But now how do we distribute them?

Bring in the horse: YouTube.

Assistant Dexter’s City Manager, Justin Breyer, tells us, “Dexter is a busy community and it is an interesting and fun place to live – there are always events and activities taking place. With the creation of these videos, the City was well-positioned to join this medium and use it to tell the City’s story.”

Click here to watch the City’s inaugural videos.

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