Soft Power
Soft power is the persuasive approach to international relations, typically involving the use of economic or cultural influence. But what does that mean for cities, nations, and places? If you can leverage your soft power effectively in your place marketing and place branding strategy, you can create far greater impact and leverage your reputation to meet your goals. Here, we’ve collated a wealth of resources to help you with your journey.
This Soft Power Topic Zone is sponsored by

Brand Finance
Brand Finance is the world’s leading brand evaluation and strategy consultancy. We help place brands evaluate marketing activities and develop successful strategies. Headquartered in the City of London, we are present in 25 countries worldwide.
We have published the top 100 most valuable and strongest Nation Brands ranking for nearly 20 years. In 2020, we launched the Global Soft Power Index – the world’s most comprehensive research study on perceptions of nation brands, surveying opinions of 100,000+ respondents in 100+ markets.
Can nation brand perceptions predict performance?
As the world becomes increasingly connected, soft power is an important tool that nations can leverage to achieve economic success. Brand Finance's Place Branding Director Konrad Jagodzinski explores the link between nation brand perceptions and performance and shares some ideas on how you can leverage your soft power to grow your economy.
Managing Ukraine’s nation brand during a war
Maria Lypiatska, Head of BRAND UKRAINE and Strategic Communications Advisor for the MFA, outlines how they’re telling Ukraine’s story to the world during a war and shares lessons from crisis communications that hopefully you’ll never need to use.
Moldova for Peace
On the 24th of February 2022, the war in Ukraine started, forcing hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians to leave their home country. As a multinational country, many of whose citizens had previously expressed pro-Russian views, Moldova faced a communication crisis. Discover how Invest Moldova launched a campaign to unite the nation.
More from Soft Power
Focusing on what really matters
Understanding the perspectives of different target audiences is central to a successful place brand strategy. Join Brand Finance to discover how to use perceptions research to uncover what really matters and how that differs across audiences.
Global and local – understanding your place in the world by focusing on what makes you special
How should places in the UK respond to global issues? Dr Martin Reeves, CEO at Coventry City Council, and thinkingplace's John Till explore how you can root a response to global challenges in your unique assets to engage your citizens and private sector partners.
Estonia's strong place brand narrative supported them through crises. Here's how.
After five years, Estonia's place brand strategy was well-established. But when crisis struck and Russia invaded Ukraine, they needed a way to update their approach to showcase their values and rally their stakeholders around their vision. Learn more about their award-winning strategy here.
Behind the GREAT campaign's success
Since its launch, the GREAT Campaign has created a wealth of world-class place marketing campaigns - but what's the secret to their success? Before Andy Pike, Director of the GREAT Britain & Northern Ireland Campaign, joins us at City Nation Place UK, we caught up with him to understand more about the strategy and vision behind the campaign.
An international perspective: positioning Stockholm as a city of wellbeing and purpose
Anna Gissler, CEO of Invest Stockholm, explores how you can create a clear ethos and philosophy for your place to anchor your positioning and how to leverage placemaking to foster community and wellbeing.
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CloseKonrad leads Brand Finance’s place branding and soft power practice. He liaises with clients, directs consulting projects, and is responsible for the creation and promotion of the annual Global Soft Power Index and Nation Brands studies.
Konrad has extensive experience in advising clients in the fields of place branding and public diplomacy. Before joining Brand Finance, he worked at the Polish Embassy in London where he developed and delivered successful marketing communications campaigns as well as media relations programmes of official engagements by the president, prime minister, government ministers, and the ambassador.
In his role at Brand Finance, Konrad has advised a variety of place branding organisations, including New Zealand Story, the Australian Trade and Investment Commission, and the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland.
Konrad has qualified with the Professional PR Diploma from the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR). He studied European Studies MA at King’s College London and the Humboldt University in Berlin, and International Relations with Political Science BA at the University of Birmingham.