The effectiveness of place brand communication

•One of the first quantitative studies assessing the effectiveness of place branding.•Physical place brand communication affects attracting target groups positively.•WOM place brand communication affects attracting target groups positively.•Traditional place brand communication has no effect on attracting target groups.•No differences found between the effects on attracting residents and visitors. The study presented in this paper is one of the first quantitative, empirical studies addressing the effectiveness of place branding. This paper assesses whether three different strategies for place brand communication have a positive effect on attracting residents and visitors. The expectation is that this effect is mediated by the place brand image. In order to test the conceptual model that explains these relationships, data was gathered from a nationwide survey of Dutch place marketing professionals and analyzed using structural equation modeling. The empirical analysis shows that both physical place brand communication and word-of-mouth place brand communication have similar positive effects, mediated by the place brand image, on attracting both residents and visitors. There is no evidence that the effects were significantly different for attracting residents and visitors. Finally, traditional place brand communication has neither a direct effect on the place brand image nor a mediated effect by the place brand image on the attraction of residents and visitors.