Effectiveness of Branding, Opinion Leader and Government in the Establishment of Thematic Village in Semarang City, Indonesia

Abstract

One of efforts to develop a country’s economic condition is by implementing city brand building. Brand building of the city consists of five phases, which determine the success of branding itself, namely (1) market investigation, analysis and strategic recommendations, (2) brand identity development, (3) brand launch and introduction-communicating the vision, (4) Brand implementation, (5) monitoring, evaluation, and review. Besides the phases, two other contributing factors to the success of city brand building are opinion leaders and the government. This study compares the effectiveness of branding, opinion leaders, and the government in two thematic villages in Semarang, Indonesia, using Mann Whitney test. The results of data processing indicate that there are significant differences between the effectiveness of branding, opinion leaders, and the government of the two villages. Through this research, it is expected that the formation of the thematic villages is based on the five phases of branding building as well as involvement of opinion leaders. In addition, the government needs to implement policies that support the brand building.