CALL FOR CHAPTERS
Submission deadline: May 1, 2007
Information Communication Technologies and City Marketing:
Digital Opportunities for Cities around the World
A book edited by
Mila Gascó-Hernández (International Institute on Governance of Catalonia, Barcelona, Spain), and
Teresa Torres-Coronas (Rovira i Virgili University, Tarragona, Spain)
Introduction
City marketing means designing a city to satisfy the needs of its target markets. It succeeds when citizens and businesses are pleased with their community, and the expectations of visitors and investors are met. Indeed, city marketing as such is not a new phenomenon. However, nowadays, as a result of the global transformations that are deeply impacting the organization of the local level, cities have been compelled to actively compete with each other. More than ever, cities need to attract tourists, factories, companies, and talented people, as well as find markets for their exports, and this requires that cities adopt strategic marketing management tools and conscious branding. As a result, several city marketing methods, approaches and instruments have been designed to attract the attention of the city stakeholders. Nevertheless, despite the important investments of the last few years, there is still an important tool, brought about by the new era, which remains unexplored: the new information and communication technologies and, particularly, the Internet.
The Overall Objective of the Book
This book is aimed at understanding how ICTs can contribute to the development of city marketing strategies and, therefore, to enhance local socio-economic development . In particular, its overall objectives are to describe the concept of city marketing and to analyze its contribution to the city's competitiveness, to identify the potential applications of ICTs in city marketing, to provide insightful analysis about those factors that contribute to a successful use of ICTs by city marketers, to propose strategies to move forward and to address future challenges that involve the whole array of city stakeholders, and to identify and describe international successful experiences that explain the previous issues.
The Target Audience
This book will be useful to p oliticians and public sector officials (civil servants) who need a convenient source of information on what ICTs can do for city marketing and on what other local governments are doing in this field, to private companies executives, leaders and consultants who frequently liaise with government agencies to design and implement city marketing strategies, and to academicians, researches and students interested in the field of city marketing and/or in the field of the use of ICTs by local governments.
Recommended topics include but are not limited to any cases, experiences or best practices related to the issue of ICTs and city marketing. Also, manuscripts about the
conceptual link between those two terms will be accepted.
SUBMISSION PROCEDURE
Researchers and practitioners are invited to submit on or before May 1,
2007, a 2-5 page manuscript proposal clearly explaining the mission and concerns of the proposed chapter. Authors of accepted proposals will be notified by June 1, 2007 about the status of their proposals and sent chapter organizational guidelines. Full chapters are expected to be submitted by September 30, 2007. All submitted chapters will be reviewed on a blind review basis. The book is scheduled to be published by Idea Group, Inc.,
www.idea-group.com, publisher of the Idea Group Publishing, Information Science Publishing, IRM Press,
CyberTech Publishing, and Idea Group Reference imprints
in 2008.
Inquiries and submissions can be forwarded electronically (Word document) to: