Trends & Insights

Blog posts bringing together takeaways from events, interviews, and our conversations with place branding practitioners around the world that suggest important trends, or provide inspiring ideas.

Trends & Ideas

Defining Conventions as Urban Innovation and Economic Accelerators

Although the services provided by the meetings industry often go unnoticed, they are a catalyst for economic growth. They have the power to influence how a city is shaped, including who lives there, who works there and who visits year-to-year. What’s more, conferences can determine what other industries flock to the region and ultimately whether long-term investment opportunities will succeed or fail.

label_outline Economic Development
Trends & Ideas

Performance Management in Place Branding

“There’s no one size fits all solution” offered Chris Fair, CEO of Resonance in summing up Robert Govers’ session on unlocking accountability at the CNP Global Forum. That’s good to know, but where does it leave place brand leaders looking for standardized KPIs that will inform place brand strategy and justify budgets?

label_outline Data
Trends & Ideas

Nations vs. regions vs. cities

If you get the nation brand right, the regions and cities can thrive within it. This key insight emerged from the session featuring input from Conrad Bird, Director, Great Britain Campaign, Prime Minister’s Office. How does this sit with the approach of other place brand leaders?

label_outline Collaboration
Trends & Ideas

City Nation Place Think Tank: Key lessons

Over 50 place brand practitioners from all over the world gathered together on the day before this year’s City Nation Place conference to share insights on two key topics – when to initiate or refresh a place brand strategy and how to engage key stakeholders. The Think Tank was led by Dr Keith Dinnie, author of Nation Branding: Concepts, Issues, Practice and editor of the book City Branding: Theory and Cases [both published by Palgrave-Macmillan].  In this report, Giannina Warren, Lecturer in Advertising and Promotional Culture at Middlesex University in the UK, summarises the key findings and insights of the session.

label_outline CollaborationPlace Branding