City Branding

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City Branding
Branding...

• Søren Smidt-Jensen
• Urban Landscape Studies
• Forest Landscape Denmark

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City Branding- a tool for change?

• Søren Smidt-Jensen
• Urban Landscape Studies
• Forest Landscape Denmark

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• What is branding?
• What is place-branding?
• What is city-branding?

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• Is city-branding relevant for SMC?
• Is it particulary relevant for cities in
  transition (cities searching for or achieving a
  new role)

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• What kind of branding, place-marketing,
  image-building, identity-building is taking place
  in the MECIBS cities?
• What experiences have been made?

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What is brandning?

• A proces that makes it possible to sell a product
  to new customers, and also still can be sold to
  old customers
• This takes place by having a clear and consciuos
  profile, that creates an emotional image, and by
  using marketing and advertising finds new and old
  loyal customers
• The brand is the whole entity of the product, and
  the STORY about the product

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What is brandning?

• Something more than just marketing
• Adding stories, values, emotions, pictures to a
  product (or building it into it)

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Place brandning

• Country branding
• City branding
• City-area branding
• (Tourist) Destination branding

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City brandning

• A proces that makes it possible to sell a city
  (or city products) to new customers, and also
  still can be sold to old customers (e.g. old
  inhabitants, investors, city-product buyers)
• Something more than just city-marketing
• Adding stories, values, emotions, pictures to a
  city
• dig up old stories about the city
• create new stories, fairytales
• building it into the city, fx also in the urban
  space

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Branding MECIBS cities

• Randers and Nyköping
• Pskov, Nakskov, Jüterbog, Herning-Ikast-Brande,
  Lappenranta

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Branding Randers

• City of violence
• City of scandals
• A city that has lost its identity

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Branding Randers

• Persuading people to stay in Randers (not so much
  about selling Randers to outsiders, mainly people
  in Århus)
• Needs to get beyond the (post-)industrialisation
  image
• Citizens should be proud of the city again - they
  have lost their faith in constructive dialogue
  because of scandals at Laksetorvet

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• Is it necessary to brand Randers when we could
  use the money for a lot of other things,
  especially now when we need to cut spendings in
  the municipality budget? To my mind it is of
  great importance not to stop development in a
  period when you need to save money. When the
  bonds are tightening, when we feel economic
  pressure more than usual, creativity and new ways
  of thinking is perhaps more important than ever,
  and a need to profile Randers internally and
  externally. (Mayor of Randers, Michael Aastrup
  Jensen).
• Speech at the citizen meeting in Randers
  09-12-03 where the branding-campaign was
  presented.

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• Involvement of the residents that is the most
  important, that this will be a project where all
  inhabitants are involved 100. I hope that this
  will result in that all citizens are good
  ambassadors of the city. (Mayor of Randers,
  Michael Aastrup Jensen).
• Speech at the conference Branding, Urban
  Identity and Housing Politics, Randers, 27-11-03.

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Branding Nyköping

• In-house model - the municipality has a
  marketing department
• Branding campaign to attract new inhabitants from
  Stockholm
• Co-branding with Ryanair

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Branding Nyköping

• Co-branding Ryanair Nyköping
• 55-mio SEK aggreement (10 years)

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Branding Nyköping

• The co-operation with Ryanair has opened the
  door to an enormous European market.The deal is
  an investment in Nyköpings future. 200 jobs
  today, 1000 jobs tomorrow is just the beginning
  of a fantastic development.
• (Göran Forsberg, Mayor, Nyköping).
• Today, the Ryanair-brand is worth several
  millions that Nyköping now has the chance to hook
  up on.
• (Ulf Dahlqvist, Director of Information
  Marketing, Nyköping Municipality).

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Branding Nyköping

• Nyköping - the attractive alternative (to
  Stockholm)
• Newspaper adds in STK papers
• Adds at housing/real estate websites
• A special website presenting Nyköping as a place
  to live (with added life-value)
• Open city activities

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Branding opposition

• Branding! Just the word shines of advertising,
  and more or less conscious attempts to blow up
  things to look better than they are. In the
  branding-report on Randers made by ElevenDanes
  Randers is compared with a 50 year old man, who
  drinks cheap red-wine. I would prefer not to have
  that predicate pulled down over a city that I
  very much like to live in. What is the point of
  all this besides entertainment?
• (Uffe Thorsen, member of Randers City Council for
  Beboerlisten).

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Useful city-branding?

• City-branding seems to be increasingly necessary,
  also for SMCs
• Potentially, it can expand the reach of the
  city, and city-prodcuct, outwards
• Searching for city stories, city values,
  city pictures (images) and city visions, can
  be especially relevant for cities that have lost
  their identity during a phase of transition
  (Inward-branding)
• It can create joining visions (and missions), and
  bring citizens and local actors together - but it
  can also create split-visions
• How much resources (money!) should be used, and
  is it necessary for all SMC?

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City Branding

• Søren Smidt-Jensen
• Urban Landscape Studies
• Forest Landscape Denmark

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City Branding

• Søren Smidt-Jensen
• Urban Landscape Studies
• Forest Landscape Denmark