About TPBO
Independent editorial coverage and intelligence for the people shaping cities, regions and nations.
Since 2014, TPBO has documented how places build identity, attract investment and talent, and compete for reputation. That decade of reporting now powers both our journalism and our intelligence products, one of the world's most comprehensive independent knowledge bases on place branding.
What We Do
Editorial
Independent reporting on how places build reputation.
Every week, TPBO publishes interviews, analysis and feature stories exploring how cities, regions and countries communicate identity, attract investment and talent, strengthen visitor economies and navigate change. Our editorial independence allows us to identify emerging ideas, challenge conventional thinking and showcase innovative practice from around the world.
Intelligence
Editorial insights transformed into comparative analysis.
More than a decade of reporting has created a unique editorial archive of place branding practice. TPBO Intelligence draws on this archive to identify positioning trends, emerging narratives and comparative patterns, helping organisations better understand how they are perceived in relation to their peers.
Community
Connecting the people shaping places.
TPBO brings together practitioners, researchers and public sector leaders through interviews, expert contributions, industry recognition and collaborative editorial initiatives. By connecting diverse perspectives, we help strengthen the global conversation around place branding and reputation.
Explore hundreds of articles, interviews and insights across the TPBO platform.
Place Brand Leaders Yearbook
Our annual flagship publication brings together leading voices, outstanding place branding practice and original editorial insights from around the world.
Intelligence Briefs
Editorial intelligence built on more than a decade of independent reporting, offering comparative perspectives on place positioning and reputation.
Editorial Team
TPBO is led by founder and publisher Florian Kaefer, supported by an international team of editors, researchers and contributors with expertise spanning place branding, destination development, investment promotion, talent attraction and strategic communications.
Publisher & Editor-in-Chief
Florian Kaefer (PhD) founded The Place Brand Observer in 2014 and leads its editorial direction. He holds a doctorate in place branding and has spent over a decade documenting how cities, regions and nations build reputation, connecting the field's leading practitioners, researchers and public-sector voices through TPBO.
Why TPBO Matters
Reputation is now one of the defining strategic assets of cities, regions and countries, shaping investment, talent, tourism and trade.
Yet reputation cannot be managed through marketing alone. It is shaped by policy, leadership, culture, lived experience and the stories places consistently tell about themselves.
TPBO exists to document, analyse and interpret these developments independently, helping practitioners and decision-makers better understand how places are positioned today, and where they're heading next.
Wherever you are on your place branding journey, The Place Brand Observer is an incredible resource. By bridging research and practice, the team links contemporary thinking with real-world case studies. The resources provide relevant, actionable advice for anyone in this exciting and important field.
Jess Radford
Acting CEO, Brand TasmaniaThe Place Brand Observer is a unique organisation based in Switzerland, one of the world’s most respected countries that is taking a scientific and considered view of nation branding and soft power. As such, its efforts have to be applauded.
David Haigh
Chairman, Brand FinanceI am impressed with the work of The Place Brand Observer, the best organization for bringing together place branding researchers and professionals, and letting them engage in improving the theory and practice of Place Marketing.
Professor Philip Kotler
USAWhat I like the most about The Place Brand Observer is that is it not simply a collection of copy-paste material but that it is built on the editors' curiosity to understand more about place branding, from which we can all benefit.