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INTRODUCTION
City branding has in recent years become a prevailing activity within city management. Cities all over the world use several conduits to promote themselves to relevant audiences such as investors, visitors and residents and in their efforts they commonly include striking logos and captivating slogans that feature in welcoming websites and advertising campaigns in national and international media. At the same time, a substantial debate over the usefulness and proper application of city branding has accumulated among academics, consultants and government officials. Various issues have been raised in this debate and the suggestions for the implementation of branding campaigns within cities are often countered by critical voices. This paper examines the phenomenon of city branding attempting to clarify some of the issues involved. To that end, two related literatures need to be brought together, namely the steadily growing literature on place branding and the extensive literature on corporate brands.
CITIES AS BRANDS
Slogans such as 'Das Neue Berlin', 'Basel beats differently' or 'Edinburgh: Inspiring Capital' are increasingly commonplace. Amsterdam has recently launched a branding campaign centring around the slogan 'I amsterdam'; Athens successfully hosted the Olympic Games of 2004 and is now anxiously anticipating their positive effects inviting you to 'surprise yourself in Athens Attica'; London has become 'Totally London' and will also host the Olympic Games of 2012, expecting the same results. The examples of cities attempting to brand themselves could fill many pages. The popularity of place branding but also the necessity for a wide discussion on the topic is demonstrated in the special issues devoted to it (Journal of Brand Management , 2002) and the launching of a specialised journal in 2004 (Place Branding --Palgrave Publishers). Place branding is defined as 'the practice of applying brand strategy and other marketing techniques and disciplines to the economic, political and cultural development of cities, regions and countries' (http://www.palgrave-journals.com/pb). This raises questions about what actually is being done in practice and whether it is possible to apply strategies developed for commercial products to places or whether a new type of branding is required. Branding is only one of many possible instruments for managing and developing places and its effectiveness needs, therefore, to be evaluated in that context. Although '...the practice of...