Interview with Gergely Böszörményi Nagy On Country Branding For Hungary

„Branding should be as important for a country as it is for a product, though many overlook it. Now Hungary is finally taking its own brand seriously. The task facing Gergely Böszörményi Nagy and his colleagues is daunting; develop a single, unifying brand for Hungary, channel all government communications to reflect it, and as part of the process, help Hungarians rediscover their love for Europe. Böszörményi Nagy rejoices in the very long title of Deputy Head of the Department for Strategic Communication at the State Secretariat for Government Communications.

Fortunately, the idea around which all Hungarian branding communication will coalesce is somewhat shorter: Potential.

Having established an umbrella brand word, the next step was to break it down. “We decided on separate focus areas: Creative Potential; Green Potential; Healing Potential; and Market Potential,” explains Böszörményi Nagy. The concentration on focus areas is interesting.

The deputy head’s background is as a marketing professional, not a politician. Targeted messaging, he says, is vital. “I don’t believe in general branding for a country like those CNN spots. They are all very colourful, very similar, not very credible, and they all look alike; you could be talking about Malaysia or Croatia.

You have to look very seriously about where to buy media and advertising spots.” Instead, the idea is to focus on niche areas, smart branding, if you like, rather than blanket generalizations. Thus marketing for the Healing Potential will target people interested in health tourism, for example. Communications around Market Potential will address the business world; intellectuals will, in part, be the focus for Creative Potential. The drive has come too late for the EU Presidency – a fully thought through strategy is expected to be in place by this fall, to take effect from the beginning of 2012.”