Place branding: marketing in a s-Low tourism perspective

The stream of research on place branding is rather young, theorical and empirical applications of marketing strategies and techniques to places are boosting. In this chapter we analyze the cultural traits and the connection between culture and place brands, with a particular focus on identity and image. The relationship between culture, identity and image and the practice linkage among these elements is apllied to “s-Low” cities that have been identified as belonging to the same cluster by the network of researcher of engaged in the project “Centrality of territories”, and composed by scholars form the Universities of Bergamo, Beauvais, Cambridge, Charleroi, Girona, Lubecca and Santander. In this manner we provide managerial indications by focusing on “sustainability”, a relevant cultural-identitarian pillar upon which place brands are now widely developed, and a principal constituent of the “s-Low” network.