From the streets of Manila to the outback Queensland township of Winton, governments are reinventing their brands to attract visitors and power their economies.

Government and the tourism industry will come together for the inaugural Place Branding Australia conference to share insights and reveal how cities can attract investment, jobs and services by identifying what makes them unique, redefining their identities and telling their stories.

Whether it’s a major event, the creation of a prominent place, urban design project or marketing campaign, every contribution goes a long way in boosting the profile of a city or region, according to program director Stu Spiers.

“A place’s actions are at the core of any place branding strategy’s ultimate success,” he said.

“Effective place branding will always be grounded in a firm understanding of what it is that a place and its residents do, and in turn, how that makes it distinct from others.”

The event will take place on 4 June 2019, as part of the 2019 Vivid Ideas program in Sydney.

“Vivid is founded in, and fosters the creative industries, an umbrella term for a range of fields that Sydney outperforms most others in,” said Spiers. “Indeed, it is arguably this fundamental truth at the heart of Vivid Sydney’s incredible growth story.”

Speaker line-up

Place Branding Australia will bring together leading minds to give attendees a toolkit to redefine their localities and turn them into visitor destinations.

Social media data analytics expert Jessica Christiansen-Franks, co-founder and CEO of Neighbourlytics, will kick off the day with a session on evidence-based place branding based on unearthing and leveraging a community’s social data.

Christiansen-Franks has helped create vibrant suburbs by showing policy makers how to uncover information about their localities and use the data to inform planning decisions. She’ll share insights into how user-generated content on social media – whether it’s a photo of smashed avocado on toast or an invitation to a dog-training session – can inform powerful place branding.

Sonia Casanova, director of marketing at digital marketing agency The Articulate Pear, will talk about the approach to extensive community consultation behind creating a shared brand vision for council following months of community apprehension following council mergers.

Delegates will also hear how powerful brands can be created by embracing the past, with Nick Sampson, strategy director at independent branding agency Principals (NZ), talking about how city-makers can inspire a community to take ownership of a place brand.

Travis Tiddy, director of the Unconformity Festival, will outline how an arts festival managed to attract thousands to a small Tasmanian mining town by embracing the town’s past and local creativity.

Place Branding Australia, hosted by Government News and organised by Interpoint Events, will be held at Intercontinental Hotel Sydney on 4 June 2019 during Vivid Sydney.

The full conference program is available here and you can register to attend here.

For more information, visit the Place Branding Australia website.