Korean president Lee Myung-bak announced Friday a plan to establish a committee to raise the country’s brand value under the presidential office. In a speech to commemorate the 60th birthday of the Republic of Korea in Seoul, he pledged to “upgrade the national brand to make it on par with that of advanced countries.” “The…
Yes, Nation Branding as such, is 10 years old this month. It’s 10 years since Simon Anholt first wrote these words together and defined its concept, according to most sources. It was at this edition of the Journal of Brand Management that Anholt began the revolution in the way countries manage their reputation. Nonetheless, 10…
On July 4th, nation branding experts from around the world participated in the international seminar Construction and Projection of Nation Branding: a Case Study Comparison. The seminar was held in Santiago (Chile) and opened by the President of the Republic of Chile, Michelle Bachelet. Attendees included representatives from institutions promoting nation brands and tourism in…
An interesting article on the problems the Branding the Baltic Region effort is encountering: Brand new thinking on being Baltic by Mike Collier What have Russia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Germany, Denmark, Poland, Finland and Sweden got in common ? Anyone who answers “a Baltic coastline” may think they are on the money. But for those…
“Land of the Lost Children”, “Land of the Dungeons”, “Horror land” – there are growing concerns among Austrians about the international image of their country. One commentator in the Austrian daily newspaper Der Standard sums it up by quoting a German taxi driver as commenting on the country’s “beautiful mountains – and such ugly cellars”….
Ukraine has gloomy image in the world, and needs badly a new image, but Kateryna Malyhina writes that it seems that Ukraine is still not ready for a nation branding effort: In today’s post-industrial world the creation of a positive and appealing image of a country has become very important. Transnational companies understood the rule…
Launched as a platform to effectively market the country, it has remained stillborn while other countries like South Africa are realising tangible economic benefits from similar initiatives. “The issue of Brand Kenya is a sad story. What it lacked was a champion inside the Government,” says Julius Kipngetich, Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) Director. Kipngetich was…
Nation branding guru Simon Anholt’s latest Anholt Nation Brands Index report brings data on Spain, Portugal and Greece. This generated graph shows how the brands of Spain, Portugal and Greece compare according to the report. The first conclusion to draw is that Spain has a more solid, consistent and powerful brand than those of Greece…
There are a handful of good nation branding indexes including the Nation Branding Perception Index, the Reputation Institute Soft Power Survey, the Nation Image Index, BrandFinance’s Global Nation Brands league and the always attractive Monocle’s Soft Power Survey, but two indexes usually steal the show: the Nation Brands Index (NBI) and the Country Brand Index (CBI). It’s easy to confuse them since…
Taken from here: Israel Looking for an Extreme Makeover – by Bill Berkowitz It hasn’t been the easiest year for Israel. There was this past summer’s widely condemned attack on Lebanon and the recent disclosure by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert that his country has a nuclear arsenal, not to mention the ongoing death and…
[Taken from here] The tools of brand marketing throw useful analytical light on the problems Israel faces in the court of world public opinion. Sophisticated salesmanship cannot solve Israel’s fundamental problems, but the discipline of brand management has some useful lessons nevertheless for a nation that must trade, attract investment and tourists, and participate in…
Larry Defner has written extensively about Israel’s image in the world at this page: Nobody and nothing in the world has an army of advocates, defenders, PR people, marketers, spin-meisters and image-polishers like Israel has. This army isn’t made up just of the government, but of Jews and Judeophiles all over the world, especially in…
