DOI: 10.7763/IPEDR. 2012. V57. 5 Toward Identification of Place Brand Identity Distinguished Features. Polish Towns case Study 1 Ewa Glinska 1+ , Magdalena Florek 2 1 Bialystok University of Technology, Poland 2 Poznan University of Economics, Poland Abstract. Shaping a positive image of a particular town/city has become one of the possibilities to achieve the competitive advantage of a place. Strategic management of the place image requires from its managers skilful selection of the key elements of place identity to be utilized in the process of shaping the desired image. The aim of the paper therefore is to analyze the range of perceived distinguishing features of place identity based on Anholt’s city brand hexagon classification. It is illustrated by the research conducted on selected towns in Poland among a group of their social and economic leaders. The research method used to prepare the paper was focus group interview. The results presented in the paper indicate that the features mentioned by the respondents represent significant benefits for the residents and most of them cannot be considered unique and strong enough to resist the actions taken by competitive towns. Consequently, in the brand building context, there is a need for creating additional attributes, especially of emotional nature, which would become the base of place brand identity on which links with all towns’ stakeholders could be built. Place Identity, Place Image, Place Brand, \City Brand Hexagon. 1. Introduction Last decades places of diverse scale, e.g. communities, cities, provinces, regions, and countries have adopted the branding concept to build an attractive image and foster their development. In the competition for tourists, investors, new residents, students, etc., places make the effort to establish themselves as brands and use a marketing approach to fulfil the needs and wants of the target groups. Developing effective place branding strategies is considered to be central in drawing together a range of local economic development plans and urban regeneration schemes (Walker, 2000). It is not surprising, therefore, that places look for distinguishing features of their identity, which will allow them to build an image attractive for those around them. 2. Place Identity In the literature of the subject, different ways of conceptualisation of the term “place identity”, and thus different ways of its application, can be found. Among them are those that understand place identity as a part of individual (human) identity or identification of a group with a territory. However, in the place branding concept, most references relate to the understanding of identity as a sense of place, "character", "personality" and distinctiveness (Kalandides, 2011). In this context, place identity may be described as "a set of features, often historically conditioned, that are characteristic of a given town/city, distinguish it from others and express themselves in all activities taken by the town/city with the aim to create its unique personality and character" (Łuczak, 2000). Despite the variety of views on brand identity emphasis is always placed on the fact that it should determine the meaning, intent and mission of the brand. City identity contains some static elements but also some flexible ones. The staticity of city identity is based on those features of a city which do not change over time (such as geographical location, traditions, history or cultural heritage). The flexibility in approaching city identity, on the other hand, should result from 1 Research study financed from funds for science in the years 2010-2013 as research project No. N N115 155939 Identification of city identity markers and analysis of the degree to which they are used in city image management in Poland. + Corresponding author. Tel.: + 48857469820; fax: + 48856631988. E-mail address: ewaglinska@pb.edu.pl 27 Keywords: