Country Branding

Companies like Coca-cola and Apple are famous for their brands and others like GM are a little more infamous. A brand is a mix of characteristics such as packaging, product design or service that creates value and allows customers to be able to make choices in a cluttered market. Brands are typically associated with products people can buy in a store… but have you thought about if a country has a brand and how that brand image changes over time?

For the past couple years, Simon Anholt, famous for his work in national identity and public diplomacy, along with GfK Roper Public Affairs and Media, has published a Nation Brand Index Report which measures the reputation of a country based on six variables: Exports, Governance, Culture, People, Tourism, and Immigration and Investment. According to Simon Anholt, a positive brand attracts foreign investment, increases tourism, helps increase exports and brings in skilled immigrants. Whereas a negative brand, which could be associated with nuclear threat, poverty and unpopular government could turn people away.

I thought it would be interesting to map the changing brand image of the world’s countries. The latest Nation Brand Report in 2008 ranked 50 different countries around the world based on the six dimensions mentioned above. In 2007, 35 countries were ranked. Below is a map where I have overlaid the standardized rankings for these two years.

As you can see, many countries’ images have improved from 2007-2008 (Mexico, India, China, France, Denmark, Egypt, etc) and some countries, according to the variables have decreased (Spain) or dropped off the list (Wales, Portugal). Turn each of the layers on and off to see how many countries’ brands haven’t changed by much. A more in depth look at what happened in those countries would explain the drop or increase in brand image during that time. It would also be interesting to see how these countries will rank next year after taking into consideration the impact of the financial downturn.

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