Place Marketing

Although there are examples for promoting cities dating back to 1850, place marketing is a relatively new field of academic research. Even if the topic becomes increasingly important, because of the rising competition between cities for attracting investors, companies, new citizens, qualified workforce (talents) and tourists, still nowadays place marketing agencies repeatedly concentrate just on the promotional aspects of marketing and therefore often fail in using all the potential of a integrated marketing strategy.

Like marketing in general place marketing could be understood as “an organizational function and a set of processes for creating, communicating, and delivering value to customers and for managing customer relationships in ways that benefit the organization and its stakeholders“ (American Marketing Association, 2009) but with the focus of places. Its aim is through “… a process whereby local activities relate as closely as possible to the demands of target customers (…) to maximize the efficient social and economic functioning of the area concerned, in accordance with whatever wider goals have been established” (Ashworth and Voogd, 1990, p.11). Therefore, as one mayor trend in place marketing, more and more techniques and concepts from especially the corporate branding are used for creating and communicating a place brand image. Due to Kotler and his colleagues (1993, p.18), only one aims for place marketing and branding is to “promote a place’s values and image so that potential users are fully aware of its distinctive advantages” and foremost to distinguish the city from other cities.

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References:

• American Marketing Association. (2009). Dictionary of Marketing Terms. from http://www.marketingpower.com/_layouts/Dictionary.aspx?dLetter=M
• Ashworth, G. J. and Voogd, H. (1990), Selling the city: marketing approaches in public sector urban planning, Belhaven, London.
• Kotler, P., Haider, D. H. and Rein, I. (1993), Marketing Places: Attracting Investment, Industry, and Tourism to Cities, States, and Nations, The Free Press, New York.