Internal city branding: An abstract

City branding involves the application of branding principles to cities, to help them achieve competitive advantages. The goal is to market the cities to residents as a place to live, to companies as a place to do business and to visitors as a place to visit. Among the target groups of city branding, residents are both an important internal target group of city branding efforts and a strategically valuable resource as co-creators in the city branding process. Although researchers have called for a consideration of internal branding for more than a decade, it has not been properly adapted to the city branding context. By integrating internal branding with place and city branding research, this study aims to develop a model for internal city branding which represents a concept for implementing the city brand in residents’ minds (cognitively), emotions (affectively) and behaviors (behaviorally). Its goal is to retain and attract residents, companies and visitors, through efforts that enable residents to live the city brand and its identity, fulfil the city brand promise and strengthen the city brand through their behaviors.

The results of an online survey of 446 residents from the city of Bremen in Germany reveal that residents’ city brand commitment and satisfaction both have positive effects on their intention to stay. Residents’ city brand citizenship behavior is positively affected by their commitment, satisfaction and understanding. Residents’ city brand satisfaction and understanding have positive effects on their commitment. Moreover, a positive relationship arises between residents’ city brand understanding and their satisfaction. The quality of city brand communication as a brand management-related antecedent exerts positive effects on residents’ city brand understanding and satisfaction, but not on their commitment. From a management perspective, residents’ city brand understanding represents an important objective for city brand managers that can be improved by ensuring that city brand communication is adequate, complete, credible, useful and clear.