Branding and Competition in the Global Arena with an Emphasis on the Mental Images of Mashhad Residents

  At the beginning of the 21st century, globalisation, as one of the most important scientific debates, has led to the competition of cities to gain economic profit. To be successful in this competition, cities should have some brands which are considered a new paradigm in urban marketing for attracting capital investment. One of the ways which can be used for identifying these brands is taking advantage of the city residents’ mental images. Current study aims to identify the principal components of the Mashhad city, the second most significant religious metropolitan area of ​​the world, through a qualitative approach and using mental images. Through identifying the forgotten districts of the city, some solutions are provided to maximise the use of current potentials. For this purpose, 400 Mashhad residents were reached through targeted sampling and were asked to draw their mental images and mention five most significant and memorable places of the city. Findings show that the most important elements or brands of the Mashhad city are the Razavi Holy Shrine, Mellat Park, Shohada Square, as well as Kouhsangi and Vakil Abad. Also, it is understood that for many residents, Mashhad is mainly limited to the surrounding area of Razavi Holy Shrine or routes leading to it. Furthermore, some important places and routes like Shahid Gharani, Ferdowsi, Moalem and Abdulmutallab Boulevard are found as the forgotten areas and, consequently, incapable of benefiting the city and being attracted by its residents unless they are taken into consideration. The results indicate that the use of the residents’ perceptions of the city has a beneficial role in identifying the unnoticed areas of the city as well as creating branding in the national and transnational areas which need particular attention.