As Charles Landry - the renowned pioneer of the “creative cities” concept - notes, “the stories we tell ourselves are a big part of how we become us.” At a most basic level, Landry asserts, places can say “yes” or “no.” In other words, is this locale open to change and possibility or not?

What if we could conclusively demonstrate the link between place branding and the growth of your economy?

It’s the holy grail of place branding. Which is why we’re delighted to be partnering with Bloom Consulting on a ground-breaking research project to do just that – and we’re inviting place brand, destination marketing, and investment promotion organisations to join the study.

People are places, and places are people – but residents often have the quietest voice at the stakeholder table. How can we change this?

Last week, we welcomed over 300 place branding leaders organisations across North America for two days of inspirational and thought-provoking discussions on how places can adapt and evolve to meet the new realities we’re facing. It was a challenge boiling the conference down to just a few key takeaways, but these are the four themes that resonated most for us throughout the conference...

The pandemic has altered the way that we live and work – perhaps irrevocably – and with it, cities, regions, and nations need to re-think what it is that makes their place attractive. How can places adapt and evolve their strategies to respond to these changes?

Last week, Brand Finance's 2021 Global Soft Power Summit was hosted virtually and questions of public health and COVID governance dominated both the discussions and the results of the 2021 Global Soft Power Index. “ But what can we learn from the impact felt on nations’ soft power approaches as we prepare for recovery?

The smartest response isn’t to just recreate the same processes as we were used to pre-pandemic, but to understand how we can refine and improve our everyday ‘normal’. The pandemic has exposed our weaknesses and now we need to ensure that we address these in order to be more resilient against future shocks.