How Design Thinking Can Solve Place Branding Challenges

Place branding is a complex endeavor, requiring alignment among diverse stakeholders and a clear articulation of a place’s unique identity. While traditional marketing metrics can track engagement and reach, they often fail to capture the deeper impact of a place’s brand narrative. This challenge was the focus of a recent initiative at City Nation Place, where I had the opportunity to apply Design Thinking to help a global network of place branding professionals develop meaningful Key Performance Indicators (KPIs).

The project began with a fundamental question: How can we measure the effectiveness of a place brand identity and narrative? With representatives from cities, regions, and nations worldwide, we embarked on a journey of structured problem-solving. Through three interactive workshops, I guided the group in shifting from conventional measurement approaches to a more holistic, stakeholder-centered perspective. By using Design Thinking methodologies—emphasizing empathy, ideation, and rapid prototyping—we were able to break down a complex issue into actionable insights.

One of the key breakthroughs of the process was reframing the problem. Instead of simply asking how we can track success, we asked what success should look like for different audiences. This perspective led us to articulate six core objectives for a place brand identity, ranging from internal stakeholder adoption to long-term adaptability. Once these objectives were established, we co-created KPIs that could measure both tangible and intangible impacts—ensuring that even qualitative insights, like shifts in perception or brand resonance, were included alongside more traditional metrics.

Throughout the workshops, the power of collaboration became evident. By bringing together diverse place branding professionals, we facilitated peer learning and collective problem-solving. The iterative nature of the process—brainstorming, testing ideas, refining, and validating—enabled us to develop a set of KPIs that could be used as an industry benchmark. Importantly, we also acknowledged that not everything valuable can be easily measured, a sentiment captured by the quote from James Clear: “Just because you can measure something doesn’t mean it’s the most important thing.”

The final report, built on the foundation of these workshops, provides a roadmap for place branding teams seeking to measure their impact in more meaningful ways. This initiative reaffirmed for me how Design Thinking can unlock fresh solutions to longstanding industry challenges. By fostering collaboration, prioritizing user needs, and embracing iterative problem-solving, place branding professionals can move beyond marketing metrics and towards a more strategic, impact-driven approach.

Check out the full report here: City Nation Place Special Report: Place Brand KPIs | City Nation Place