Exploring Stakeholder Collaboration in Place Branding Strategies: The Case of Northamptonshire

A distinguishing feature of ‘place branding’ in comparison to the mainstream product or corporate branding is the complexity of managing diverse stakeholders of the place. While participatory place branding is being advocated as a preferred model for implementation and development, few normative model and guidelines are available. In accordance with participatory place branding, this research asserts that all stakeholders must at least have the opportunity to be involved in place branding. However, it appears that institutional stakeholders predominantly decide the extent and level of participation of community stakeholders. For their part, community stakeholders have their own motivations and also encounter barriers to participation. Thus, this study seeks to understand how stakeholders’ perceptions relate to collaboration in ‘region branding’. It focuses on region branding since regions are the least explicated scale in place branding even though regions are important for their development and governance context. A single case study strategy has been applied in this study by examining the county-region of Northamptonshire. Stakeholders from public sector agencies, private businesses and the local community of Northamptonshire will be engaged via semi-structured interviews and focus group discussions to investigate stakeholders’ perceptions towards collaboration in creating a regional place brand.