Application of marketing principles and practices to places has gained momentum over the past twenty years. Most city and town authorities are aware of the need to embrace marketing strategies, tactics and tools to position, promote themselves, and broader, to achieve development goals. In parallel, the emerging academic field of place marketing in large part advocates the use of traditional marketing tools and techniques by city managers, emphasizing the benefits of marketing places. As a consequence of this focus, controversies arise, and the undesirable and unintended consequences of marketing cities have been largely ignored. This is not surprising since many of the impacts and outcomes of city marketing are of a long-term nature and difficult to monitor and measure.
Therefore a Special Issue of the Journal of Town and City Management will be published. The purpose is to widen the perspective of city marketing theory and practice to encourage a more holistic approach that also considers the undesirable and unintended consequences. City marketing professionals (local authorities and consultants), at the coalface of marketing, and marketing academics at the cutting edge of theory development and testing, are invited to submit papers for the special issue. Authors are encouraged to identify the important, yet often overlooked contradictions and consequences of marketing cities and town centres which frequently create controversy amongst stakeholders. All submissions must feature original content (new thinking, lessons from practice, research results, case studies, best practice) and where relevant be supported by references to examples and existing literature. (more via email)
