ABSTRACT
The chapter focuses how a participative approach that involves key stakeholders can help legitimize the practice of place branding. Place branding remains ill-defined and is often compared to or conflated with other terms, such as corporate branding, destination branding and place marketing, which leads to misconceptions as to its purpose and practice. The implication of the distinct characteristics of place branding, as well as the move towards a greater emphasis on the vital role of people in all forms of brand building, is that a more participative process is required. In spite of the similarities, place branding is also distinct from traditional branding theories, due to a number of unique characteristics Co-creation has come to be widely used in different business areas, but it is of particular relevance in the context of place brands, because the citizens, businesses and institutions that help to form a place are the substance of the brand and can be directly affected by brand decisions.
