Decoding Nordic cities: uncovering multi-level place experiences from tweets for effective city branding

This research focuses on the significance of place experiences in shaping effective place branding strategies. It introduces a novel method that leverages social media data analytics to uncover and understand place experiences, addressing the challenges of capturing these elusive experiences. The study examines the 20 major cities in the Nordic region, investigating both common and distinctive place experiences among them. Additionally, it explores the changes in place experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic, shedding light on the impact of the crisis on people's experiences in those cities. The research collected a dataset of 1,943,772 tweets associated with the 20 cities from 2017 to 2022, and employed various analytical techniques including topic modelling, associative word analysis, and principal component analysis to analyse and visualise the place experiences. Furthermore, the study demonstrates the practical applications of generative AI in place branding by using Midjourney and GPT-4 to create branding materials that capture the unique experiences of a city. Overall, the research contributes to the understanding of place experiences, introduces a multi-level perspective, and highlights the potential of generative AI in place branding.