And there’s no place on earth that can use a makeover more than Israel. So Israel is launching a rebranding effort, starting in Toronto:
Residents of Toronto shouldn’t be surprised if they soon start hearing and seeing a lot of references to Israeli wine, art and music in the next year or so. The city has been selected by the Foreign Ministry as a North American test city for its rebranding project.
Lest this be thought of as just a snow job, one of the principals behind the project explains:
“There’s a lot of confusion about branding,” said Aharoni. “People hear it and they think of advertising campaigns and PR. But it’s mainly it’s an attempt to change the mindset of people when it comes to Israel - it’s not putting on a spin. It’s about communicating through more than one channel. Right now we only communicate through the conflict.”
As for why Israel is undertaking such an effort:
[T]he hope-for result is a change in peoples’ perception of Israel, explained Aharoni.
“That’s the whole point - people don’t understand that Israel has a wonderful brand, and we need that opportunity to communicate that brand on more than just that one conflict channel,” he said.
“There are experts who have told us, ‘first you have to resolve the conflict.’ Well, thank you very much, that’s very nice. We don’t need an expert to tell us that.
But what we’re saying is that given there’s a conflict - or despite the conflict - we can still improve Israel’s performance on these other fronts of trade, tourism and cultural connections.”
Yes indeed, there’s a lot of room for improvement. And every little bit helps.
