Social Media: A New Vehicle for City Marketing in China
Social media: A new vehicle for city marketing in China
Following global trends, cities, like companies, across the world are under fierce competitive pressure. To compete and promote city brands, various levels of Chinese governments have begun to integrate multiple marketing tactics to promote cities. Social media has gained global popularity since 2008. Utilizing social media for city marketing is being applied in the Chinese cities.
Based on several cases of social media use for city marketing in major Chinese cities (e.g., Guangzhou, Chengdu and Nanjing), this document suggests that using social media is an appropriate tactic to promote cities because of the participative, interactive, open and transparent nature of social media.
Following the development of internet information technology, the development of social media has transformed the communication styles of billions of people. Social media is an interactive community built on internet and mobile platform technology. It is a technological platform that allows people to write, share, evaluate and discuss. Through internet and mobile technology, social media has fulfilled the need for increased interaction between organizations, firms and people. Social media is ideal because it reflects participative, interactive, open and transparent attributes. Because of the large number of users and the rapid propagation of social media, more organizations and businesses have recently begun to explore the potential marketing capacity of social media. The traditional measures employed in city marketing include TV, radio, newspaper, magazines and mega events (i.e., tourism festivals and sports events).
Since 2009, microblogs have become immensely popular in China. On August 7, 2012, the Chinese Xinhuanet reported that, under the concept of ‘‘Microblog for all people’’, official government microblogs were in a stage of rapid development. It was also reported that Guangzhou City, the capital city of Guangdong
Following global trends, cities, like companies, across the world are under fierce competitive pressure. To compete and promote city brands, various levels of Chinese governments have begun to integrate multiple marketing tactics to promote cities. Social media has gained global popularity since 2008. Utilizing social media for city marketing is being applied in the Chinese cities.
Based on several cases of social media use for city marketing in major Chinese cities (e.g., Guangzhou, Chengdu and Nanjing), this document suggests that using social media is an appropriate tactic to promote cities because of the participative, interactive, open and transparent nature of social media.
Following the development of internet information technology, the development of social media has transformed the communication styles of billions of people. Social media is an interactive community built on internet and mobile platform technology. It is a technological platform that allows people to write, share, evaluate and discuss. Through internet and mobile technology, social media has fulfilled the need for increased interaction between organizations, firms and people. Social media is ideal because it reflects participative, interactive, open and transparent attributes. Because of the large number of users and the rapid propagation of social media, more organizations and businesses have recently begun to explore the potential marketing capacity of social media. The traditional measures employed in city marketing include TV, radio, newspaper, magazines and mega events (i.e., tourism festivals and sports events).
Since 2009, microblogs have become immensely popular in China. On August 7, 2012, the Chinese Xinhuanet reported that, under the concept of ‘‘Microblog for all people’’, official government microblogs were in a stage of rapid development. It was also reported that Guangzhou City, the capital city of Guangdong