Is social media the perfect tool for branding cities?


  I Love NY More Than Ever 
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I’m a strong believer in the power of branding a city to attract investment, talented people, visitors and events and I’m a stronger believer in the power of social media to connect people and communities.

But, I’ve never heard of cities embracing social media or social networking strategies to build their brand.

I’m not saying it hasn’t happened before; it’s just that, I’ve never heard of any.

I see social networking as being the perfect tool for cities to connect, communicate and collaborate with people and communities at home and abroad.

Or am I just naïve?

Do Governments fear social networking openness? If true, is this fear built on a political culture of confrontation.

I don’t have any answers….but I would like to know?

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Posted under City Branding   | 3 Comments »

3 Responses to “Is social media the perfect tool for branding cities?”

  1. Matt Says:
    September 15th, 2008 at 9:47 pm

    I think there are niche social sites, but nothing that you would call a ‘city branded social site’.
    One of the problems with a city branded one is making safe for all ages to interact on, both from a ‘seedy’ point of view with younger members and also a ‘newb’ point of view with older or less web-savvy members.
    The potential is there, though wide spread adoption of social networking, for the general population, is still 2-3 years away in Australia in my opinion.
    I’m still progressing with the I Heart Newcastle website, I’ve made my way through most of the initial planning stage.. Now it’s time to work through the tech requirements, branding, etc.

  2. Julian Cole Says:
    September 16th, 2008 at 7:59 pm

    Australian Government created a facebook fan page for WYD, I think it has got larger than that thought with 55k people joining up!
    http://www.new.facebook.com/pages/Australia/11071120908?sid=5867fbbce931af21bdf76f7dd5187410&refurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.new.facebook.com%2Fs.php%3Fn%3D-1%26k%3D100000000020%26init%3Ds%253Afbpage%26q%3Daustralia%26sid%3D5867fbbce931af21bdf76f7dd5187410&ref=s

  3. Gordon Whitehead Says:
    September 17th, 2008 at 3:59 pm

    55,000 people talking to each other – I think that’s a return on investment for a simple facebook site.
    Newcastle City Council’s tourism department set-up a facebook page and got over 3,000 signed-up within a week.
    That’s another good return on investment.
    Go to: http://www.new.facebook.com/group.php?gid=34335751413#/pages/Newcastle-Australia/23723915845?ref=ts

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