Joining forces for Athens City Branding
Marina Mouka-Marianthi Lazou-Vassia B
Debriefing Serafio meetup
A fruitful meeting had been done at Serafio by the municipality of Athens and the teams “SynAthina” and “This is Athens”. As postgraduate students at Panteion University within the course “Cultural Marketing and Communication” | “Athens Co-Creation City Branding Project, 2019” we had the opportunity to be part of this meeting and see the city’s journey to become a European Capital of Innovation for 2018 and to discuss the challenges of innovation and city branding in which we will work this semester. The discussion was really constructive and gave us food for thought.
Serafio is located close to the historical area of Gazi and has recently transformed from an abandoned swimming pool into one of the Capital’s top sports, cultural and innovation Institutions of the Municipality of Athens.
Firstly, through the presentation of “This is Athens”, we saw the effort to build a unified identity for Athens and the goal for the city to be a city-break destination the whole year and not only at the summertime.
The philosophy behind “thisisathens” is well described in their website:
“We know Athens.
The official website “This is Athens” accompanies visitors through the variety of Athens.
The official City of Athens guide allows travellers to get to know the city of Athens and plan their trip beforehand with useful information on accommodation, transportation, food and city attractions.
The visitor can easily get acquainted with the Athenian neighborhoods as well as find things to do, where to go and what’s best to see in the greek capital.
With a “hand picked” cultural agenda showcasing the very best of festivals, nightlife, exhibition and events, “This is Athens” website ensures visitors won’t miss out on anything.
“This is My Athens”, a collective community of passionate locals who voluntarily offer walks around the city, are available to book through the digital platform.
Athens. One City. Never Ending Stories.”
Moreover we were showed the successful campaign with the title of: “One city-never ending stories”, that arose after a lot of work and thought. This campaign is targeted at tourists from Europe and already has positive results.
The key to a successful campaign lies in the authenticity of storytelling and this is a lesson we can get from ThisIsAthens’ work in city branding. This authenticity was achieved through the construction of personas. The effort made by the team of “ThisIsAthens” to understand the needs and the aspirations of these personalities resulted in an authentic narrative. Here is an example of a promotive video with the title “Spring break in Athens”.
Long sunny walks around ancient rocks and graffiti-spotting around the urban maze; cold cappuccino in hand and mouthwatering tapas to share; early evening Mediterranean cocktails and late-night frenzied dancing… This is Athens and it sounds exactly like your perfect spring break trip!
This is the text that accompanies the video as a brief description, but there is a narrative deficiency that is obvious. Although the context is attractive from a tourist point of view, it only highlights the greek food, the entertainment, the sunny weather and the drinks.
Afterwards we saw how Athens became European Capital of Innovation for 2018. Thanks to a series of participatory programs that involve civil society, but mainly thanks to a new culture introduced by the Municipality of Athens. More specifically the municipality managed to becοme the conductor who coordinates the city’s forces for the common benefit and that’s why Athens won the award of innovation.
Although, this award doesn’t mean that all the problems of the city of Athens were magically solved. There are many more things that need to be done to make Athens a capital worth living in for the locals, worth investing for investors and worth travelling for tourists. The team of “SynAthina” shared with us some of the challenges they are facing in order to bring about change and open up to the world.
A few words about synAthina and its mission
“SynAthina” is the common space which brings together, supports and facilitates citizens’ groups engaged in improving the quality of life in the city. By coordinating the invaluable resource of citizens’ groups, the City of Athens actively listens to the needs of its people and is thus revitalized. By supporting the activities of the citizens the City creates a new perception about the relationship between civic society and local governance and cultivates their dynamic, bidirectional bond.
SynAthina is an initiative of the City of Athens. It was created in July 2013 and today comes under the Vice Mayoral Office for Civil Society and Innovation.
The first challenge that we talk about was how to impart this “change”, this “new culture” we call innovation, that brought Athens the winning price among many European capitals, to the organisation of municipality. How the permanent human capital and the partners of municipal programs will become propagators of innovation and how they will successfully embrace and continue this vision when the next authority takes over?
The second challenge is the communication between the municipal authorities and the “informal” innovative groups and entities that contribute to the local society. The real challenge in this case is not only to establish a constructive communication channel, but also to create a common narrative for the city of Athens.
The establishment of a common policy for Athens City Branding that gives prominence to innovation and combines the promotion strategy of “This is Athens” was the third challenge we discussed. In other words, what forms the “heart” of the city’s narrative.
Following the challenges that “SynAthina” shared with us, we realized that the main issue of their attempt is to create a bridge between the municipal authorities and this new vision for Athens. Between the suggestions that we made, was the initiation of the municipal employees to this “new culture” using actions that lead to motivation. Employee motivation is one of the most important factors that can help to improve employee and organizational performance.
Another important case is to make the partners of municipal programs adopt the vision and collaborate with the “informal” innovative groups and entities. This will be achieved if the municipal authorities get a clear view of the accomplishments and the effort οf those groups, so that they can help them reach new goals and reward them for that.
Beside the above the partnership of “This is Athens” with the City of Athens, Aegean Airlines, Athens International Airport and the Greek Tourism Confederation (SETE), is a huge step to bolster the city’s visitor economy and establish Athens as an attractive destination for visitors, residents, professionals and investors and a really important start for the establishment of a common policy for Athens City Branding.
The purpose of our partnership as postgraduate students within the course “Cultural Marketing and Communication” | “Athens Co-Creation City Branding Project, 2019” with the Municipality of Athens and the teams of “This is Athens” and “SynAthina”, is to create together strategies that will encourage more innovative ideas to flourish, will engage more citizens in creative actions that will bring life to all corners of the city, and will make Athens a capital that welcomes tourists and investors with the best prospects. Branding strategies will act as a compass for our vision to make Athens the city we want.
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