A Model of City Branding through Health Tourism: The Case of Shiraz City

This study seeks to propose a city branding model which employs health tourism as the means of branding. To this end, first an overview of the relevant literature in both fields of city/place branding and health tourism is proposed to investigate the nature of the two. Then, according to the related literature, elements which are found to be necessary to be incorporated in city branding models are identified along with the relevant links which are said to be present among them in research. Based on these, the model of city branding is proposed. This model can be used to brand all cities. However, because the purpose of this study is to employ health tourism as a means of city branding, it is integrated into the proposed city branding model to make up the final model of city branding through health tourism. Next, the model is used to brand the case city of Shiraz, which is one of the biggest cities of Iran that is both a worldwide famous tourism destination and also known as a successful health tourism destination in the region. There are many modern hospitals and medical clinics and a number of very famous doctors in different specialties in Shiraz. Also, it offers unique high quality health and wellness services to patients from different countries at comparably low prices. Before being able to investigate the application of the model to Shiraz, the presence of a link between health tourism and city branding in the context of Shiraz is investigated through an empirical study. Because the results show that health tourism positively affects city branding, the model can be used to brand Shiraz. Application of the model involves ten steps which are inter-related. It is examined both qualitatively and quantitatively. The findings state that the proposed model of health tourism can be suitably applied to brand the city of Shiraz and that it provides a well-organized framework to manage the branding process of cities which are also health tourism destinations. The study has implications for all those involved in both theoretical planning and applied management of city branding, especially in cities with health tourism assets. Further research can include the application of the model in different cities and to investigate if the ten steps defined in the model are universally fit. Keywords: City Branding, Health Tourism, City branding Model, Place Branding.