Issue 9 of the MIPIM blog’s ‘Urban Intelligence’ round-up is all about city branding, and it’s fascinating and insightful reading. A real knowledge booster!
Bill Baker’s great introduction explains 14 reasons why many city branding campaigns fail. Some reasons were already obvious to me, others less so. Overall, this article really expanded my understanding of the city branding process. I highly recommend checking out Bill’s blog, or following him on Twitter @citybrander
Urban Intelligence 9 is a good mix of general city branding insights combined with more in-depth case studies of branding efforts all the way from Glasgow and the Nordics, right across the globe to Tokyo, Sydney and Singapore. I’ve touched briefly on the nation brands of Japan and Singapore in previous posts, but haven’t yet zoomed in close enough to dissect any city brands. It’ll be interesting to see how the cities compare to their countries. I also want to analyse some real place branding campaigns, both successful and unsuccessful ones, to find out precisely how it’s done, what works, and what doesn’t.
I hope 2013 is treating everyone well so far.
Do watch this space for more on #placebranding!
Bill is arguably one of the foremost experts on city branding. His advice is highly practical and very executable. His blog is one of my “must read” resources for anybody interested in city branding.
Yes, Bill’s blog was actually the first one I read when I started blogging about place branding. I’ve been following his posts ever since and always learn a great deal from them. Kudos to Bill.