The Most Social Cities Index in the making in Poland

It’s a unique initiative aimed at rating Internet social communities of cities. The study is jointly being carried out by TheStory, a digital branding agency, and Best Place – European Place Marketing Institute. The first-phase findings are available at www.TheMostSocialCities.com.

Wrocław – the fourth in terms of population Polish city – has a stronger Internet community than London? It is possible. “Utilizing the Internet for communication, including accessing social network sites and offering mobile applications, has ceased to be a luxury for the selected few, it’s become common” – says Adam Mikołajczyk from Best Place Institute.

In the first stage of the study, researchers conducted a quantitative assessment of city online communities on Facebook and AppStore. The findings can be viewed at: www.TheMostSocialCities.com. The figures show how active and strong a city’s Internet social community is, one where its members want to talk about, promote, or create applications for the city and thus invite to visit and build relations with the city.

“It is worth noting, however, that the number of Facebook fans or AppStore applications does not reflect the real strength of the city’s brand but it is an important indicator of how effective a city has been in promoting itself online” – explains Dymitr Romanowski from TheStory, a digital branding agency.

In subsequent phases of the study Best Place Institute and TheStory will address the methodology of the Index as well as look into other indicators. Findings will be posted on an ongoing basis on the TheMostSocialCities.com website.

European Place Marketing Institute is a community of experts, a place marketing think-tank, working for the development of cities, regions and countries. The Institute fosters the growth of  territorial marketing, works on perfecting marketing tools towards a sustainable development of places. Best Place provides consulting, information and educational (training, workshops, conferences, seminars, research) services for self-government entities.

TheStory is an agency specializing in digital branding. It provides advice in the field of visual communication, offering consulting and branding services in the area of new media and new technologies – the Internet, mobile devices. The agency develops brands which operate and sell their services mainly on the Internet as well as supports, through its experience, the rebranding of companies already operating on the market. Its main office is based in Warsaw and its design studio in London.

For further information please contact:  Adam Mikołajczyk, Best Place Institute: tel. +48 506170681, a.mikolajczyk@bestplaceinstitute.org  Dymitr Romanowski, TheStory: tel. +48 508720003, dymitr@thestory.pl

This article first appeared on the Best Place European Place Marketing Institute’s website, and was written in conjunction with The Story Agency.

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