Welcome to this special series of Bloom Consulting Conversations. Hosted by Clare Dewhurst, Director of City Nation Place, this series explores the world of Nation and City Branding, focusing on Bloom Consulting’s 14 key steps for building an effective Nation Brand and City Brand strategy. Each episode highlights one crucial step.
In this episode, we’re focusing on Step Thirteen of Bloom Consulting’s 14 Steps for Nation Branding: Making the Move to Nation Branding 2.0. Joined by Liina Maria Lepik, Former Director of the Estonian Tourist Board, and José Torres, CEO of Bloom Consulting, we explore how countries can evolve their Nation Branding strategies in the digital era. Together, we dive into how data-driven decision-making, agile methodologies, and digital innovation are transforming how nations position themselves globally, moving beyond traditional campaigns to smarter, scalable, and adaptive branding systems.
Clare: This time, we’re going to be looking at Nation Branding 2.0, or the Digital Identity and reputation of your Nation or Place Brand. I’m delighted to be joined by José Torres again, who is, as we all know, the CEO of Bloom Consulting. And very appropriately, our guest this week is Liina Maria Lepik, who is responsible for the international reputation and internationalization of the brand of Estonia, working with Enterprise Estonia. And those of you who are not so new to Place Branding will know that Estonia has such a strong reputation in the digital sphere. We’re delighted to have Liina with us. Welcome, Liina. Welcome, José.
Let’s start with you, José. What do you mean by Nation Brand 2.0? And what do you mean by Digital Identity?
José: Thank you, Clare. This is a topic that we started at Bloom Consulting. We started heavily in 2015, and the first time this was published was in my book in 2019.
So when I introduced the theme of Nation Branding 2.0, it’s exactly what you mentioned, the Digital Identity of nations. This is something that countries, regions, and cities need. We understood that Digital Identity would play a very important role in building and contributing to the reputation and the perception of countries, regions, and cities, of places in general.
So this is a topic that nations and cities need to manage with a specific approach. This is not just, “Oh, it’s digital, of course we can take care of our digital image and social media and so on.” It’s something that is very important because what happens online will stay online forever.
Today, we also see that if anyone wants to know about a country, or even if they don’t want to, they are influenced by what they see online. And now, they also search using AI tools. That Digital Identity, that equity, is there and needs to be managed, or at least, nations need to look at this carefully and manage it with a very professional eye.
Clare: Thank you. And I’m pleased because as you started to talk, I was thinking about the impact that AI is having on Digital Identity as well. So, we will probably come back to that. Let me come to you, Liina Maria.
Perhaps you can explain Estonia’s positioning around its digital skills, digital economy, and how that has played into your approach to managing the digital reputation of Estonia.
Liina: Well, if someone mentions Digital Identity, Estonians immediately assume they’re talking about us. We feel that Digital Identity is our story.
Of course, this is a broader concept. But the reason we “own” it in our minds is that it is our Central Idea. This is our core value. Estonia has had Digital Identity for more than 25 years.
We are a digital nation. Everything in Estonia is digital. This is the foundation. Even in 1995, when we agreed on the digital nation principles — and there were many — it’s important to note that even then, we committed to the principle of “digital first.”
Everything has to be customer-centric and based on the PPP model — public-private partnership. We can’t do anything alone. There always has to be collaboration, and everything has to be digital first.
So when we talk about branding and Digital Identity, it wasn’t even something we consciously “created” — it was just the logical first step. It’s embedded in our DNA.
Clare: I’ve been speaking with your colleagues recently about some of the AI tools that you’ve developed as well. Can you give us an update on that?
Liina: Sure. The digital sphere, digital marketing, and everything else have changed rapidly in recent years, and that means we always have to be one step ahead. Of course, that’s quite a challenge. Our brand model, the concept of Brand Estonia, has now been in place for seven years.
Over those seven years, although the core tools and principles remain in place, the world around us has changed perhaps twenty times. So, we’re in constant adjustment.
For example, just yesterday we heard that ChatGPT had launched — and that means everything has to be reconsidered. Google may already be history, so we have to be present in a new ways.
How can we influence AI so that it’s no longer just about search engine optimization? This is a whole new world. We have to be visibly present, active, and aware. That’s a new kind of challenge, and our teams are already working on it.
Clare: Obviously you’re doing everything to ensure that the messages you’re putting out, or that the search tools and algorithms are finding Estonia in the way that you would like to be found. But do you also track how that search is happening? Do you track the impression your digital presence is making on Estonia’s Nation Brand?
Liina: Of course we do. But this year, we’re focusing more and more on the positioning of our brand. And yes, it can be difficult to define exactly what a Digital Identity is — even for us.
Sometimes we confuse the brand’s Digital Identity with other things. But this year, we are focusing more and more on measuring it — and not just through the usual marketing metrics or the daily monitoring we’ve done for years, but really evaluating how the brand itself is perceived and how to measure the brand’s success.
Since the brand concept has been in place for seven years, we’re now in a kind of transition. Is our core idea — our main value — still relevant today? Is Estonia still ahead of the curve?
In some ways, we’ve made things harder for ourselves. We’ve been forerunners. So how do we continue to be forerunners? We’ve been digital — and now AI introduces a new level. People are watching closely to see what Estonia does next.
It’s a challenge — but we like challenges.
Clare: Estonia is in a unique position, because as Liina Maria has explained, everything is rooted in digital strategy. So, for places that don’t have that as a core Central idea — who have a different core Central idea — what lessons can still be taken from what Estonia has done?
José: I always tell Liina — thank God Estonia is not my client! Because I’m always talking positively about it. So, there’s no bias.
Estonia is really one of the best-case studies in the world, in my view, when it comes to Nation Branding. And the reasons are many.
Estonia was relatively unknown for many years. It was a very established nation before the Soviet Union, but that identity was suppressed and had to re-emerge in 1992. It was like starting over.
What’s fascinating is that Estonia proved you don’t have to be big. You don’t need an immense budget. You don’t need everything people think you need to build a strong brand.
Estonia had a Central Idea — being a digital nation — and they acted accordingly.
What I also love is that back then, it wasn’t even called a “Central Idea” or a “Nation Brand.” It was just strategy.
It shows that you don’t need traditional marketing. You don’t need classic communication campaigns. What you need are actions, policies, and behaviors so well aligned with your Central Idea that they resonate globally. And the world responded.
This idea — that you could become an e-Estonian, that you could get a digital ID card — was groundbreaking for most people.
Everyone was talking about it. “What’s going on? What is this progressive little country?” That’s what built Estonia’s Digital Identity.
Actually, Clare, we wrote about this in an article on the City Nation Place website, called “Proof That It Works”.
It showed how digital tools — like our Digital Demand tool — recorded rising online interest in Estonia. Not just transactional searches, but genuine curiosity about what the country was doing.
Of course, you still need marketing. But I don’t mean billboards saying, “Estonia is digital.”
I mean communications, media relations — a push to promote what’s actually happening. If you don’t do that, people won’t know.
So you need that extra push. You need to walk the talk. Estonia is the perfect example of Nation Brand 2.0 — and I always use it as a case study.
Liina: Yeah. Well, thank you for the wonderful bridging of e-Estonia, as we call it. And that’s actually an unfortunate limitation — that we cannot collaborate — because then you would be biased. But you are doing so much great stuff that we would love to be part of as well.
What you also mentioned, I totally agree with — the fact that, in some cases, it was easier for us to get attention. When the digital nation and digital services started to grow and the internet spread in the 1990s, we were doing something that actually impacted everyone globally. People wanted digital services, governments wanted transparency and efficiency, and so on.
So it ended up being very helpful for our brand, because everyone could relate to the logic. Of course, they come to Estonia and then ask us, “Where is the digital society? Show me the digital nation.”
And that is the unfortunate part — because we have nothing to show. You can only see the happy people who are not standing in line at public offices, and instead have other things to do.
Even though it has been like this for 30 years, people still come to Estonia wondering what the fuss is about.
How can a tiny country — that had kind of nothing — now be a forerunner in digital services?
For 15 years, we told the story. People would come and be amazed. It felt like a utopia — how is it possible that people actually live like that?
But for us, for example, it’s a hygiene factor. I always say that the worst kinds of promoters of the digital nation are young Estonians, because they have nothing to compare it with.
I was born in the Soviet Union, so I remember those times. But young Estonians were born into a pre-democratic republic and have lived their entire lives within it. They have not even “used” the services, because they are seamless.
So they are the worst kind of advocates for e-Estonia.
Then they go study abroad, and when they come back, they do well. We have now been truly independent for more than 30 years.
In the first decade, we focused on letting the world know that we exist — that Estonia as a republic exists.
In the second decade — the 2000s — we focused on letting the world know that we are normal, that you can do business with us, that we are just regular people.
Since the 2010s, once the digital nation was already up and running and getting international attention, we focused on letting the world know that we are special.
That has been our focus — to show that Estonia is special.
We are still telling that story, but now that we are entering the fourth or fifth decade of independence, we are asking ourselves: are we still special? Are we more special?
Or is the digital nation becoming the global standard — which we actually hope will happen?
And if so, what will be Estonia’s next story?
This is where we are now. We have talked about it so much that even we feel exhausted at times — “again, the same story.” We think everyone must know it already.
But it is still relevant. The interest is still very high. We are still unique in how advanced our digital society is, at that scale.
The story is still there. We validated it recently through different interviews, asking whether it is still relevant and whether we should still focus on it — and the answer was yes.
This is the foundation. This is what everything is built on.
At the same time, we are asking ourselves, what comes next? It will always build on top of digital services and our digital mindset. But we are in a very interesting phase at the moment.
It is still here, but it will not be here forever. So now we are asking — where should we take it? Are we still special?
Clare: Very, very interesting. And you know, you talked about being the leaders and seeing how everyone else responds. I mean, we were having a conversation the other day with Daniel Henkevelts from Toronto Global, which is the investment promotion and economic development agency for the Toronto region in Ontario, Canada.
He is going to be speaking at our global conference on our AI panel, because he was saying that, purely from an investment attraction perspective, AI changes everything.
I think José and I, and other experts in Place and Nation Branding, have been saying for years that investment promotion agencies are too similar in their marketing and in how they position their offering. It is often very hard to tell what country is behind some of that advertising from 10 or 15 years ago, because it is all about tax breaks, reliability, governance — all the things we know investors look for.
But AI has made that even more difficult, because an AI driven search tool will immediately give a prospective investor a direct comparison between potential locations.
So there has to be something else — and that is where it becomes a joy to hear from an expert. You really do need to have that Central Idea, rather than just a basic value proposition.
And so AI is going to make the core idea element of a Nation Brand or Place Brand strategy even more important.
It is really interesting to hear that you are also reflecting on this and asking, does our Central Idea still support all of that? And does it need to evolve slightly?
I mean, José, do you see other places starting to think about AI and the difference it is going to make to how their reputation is managed online?
José: Yes, I think it will become a commodity. Right now, it is a buzzword, of course, but it will eventually become a commodity. And I think all nations — and everyone we are working with — are paying close attention to this.
We use it, for instance, at Bloom Consulting. We work with nations, and actually there is a very interesting case study already, which is Costa Rica — a country we have been working with for many years — where we did an analysis of its positioning for the future.
It is exactly the kind of exercise you are doing right now, Liina.
And we did this with AI — not the classic ChatGPT — but with AI to understand and predict the future, and how that Central Idea should evolve. How the country should be positioned in the next 15 to 20 years, and how to work toward that evolution — not disruption, but evolution.
We start with a Central Idea, and then use AI to help us understand and shape strategies to move forward.
So it is not only about using AI in their Nation Brand strategy or City Brand strategy — it is about using AI as a strategic tool.
And that is a fascinating world, because at the same time, one of the things we have seen is that AI generates a lot of nonsense. You start digging deeper and you realize — oh my God — this is not true. But everyone is taking it for granted.
So, this is also going to be a big challenge for nations — the issue of disinformation, and the role AI will play in spreading it. Because people do not question what they read. No one questions.
That is going to be a serious challenge for nations. But from what I can see — from the countries and cities I have worked with — everyone is paying very close attention.
It is becoming a kind of race. But again, this will become a commodity.
Liina: And also, knowing that when you want someone’s attention, the trick is to get them onto your webpage. That is where you actually make the pitch and present what you are offering.
Of course, we have some AI tools — for example, in investor outreach. On our site, we use AI tools internally to identify how to approach different national representatives who are relevant to our story. So, we are already using it internally as well.
The core thing is that you have to have very good webpages and content, but eventually, the end user might not visit your site at all.
Everything has traditionally been based on having a strong web presence. But now, you have to be wherever the AI algorithm is picking up your information.
And the truth is, we do not really know how or where it is working, or how it is actually processing and contracting the information.
Can we really control how we are presented when questions are asked about us?
José: And also, just to complement what you said — and in response to Clare’s question — this idea that it is no longer about SEO, right? That is one of the assumptions. But at the same time, it still is about SEO, because AI is based on SEO. That is how it fetches information.
So, it is no longer visible on the front end — but the whole aspect of SEO is still very much active on the back end. The source of information and the way it is processed is still the same.
You still need to supply information and treat it in a way that AI can fetch it for you. So, the same principles apply. Even though it is a new environment, the fundamentals remain the same — even if we consider those principles to be old, and they are only ten years old.
Liina: And also, when you communicate or exchange information or your value proposition, visuals are always quite important as well.
For example, we see that the Nordic approach is to keep it simple, keep it clear, and be straightforward. And this has always been our style of presentation too.
But now, if everything becomes text based, that part — that visual layer — is cut off.
So again, it is a new challenge. You can be text wise or fact wise and be fully on top of things, but people are people. They need visuals. They need emotional stories that actually impacts them or get under their skin.
So, this is a new kind of challenge.
If we are only relying on text-based and fact-based content, then some of the aspects we have worked on for years are being cut off.
Clare: Lina, did you have any questions to ask Jose?
Liina: I do have a question. It is very philosophical — or maybe even vague — but what if AI starts making decisions on behalf of people?
So, I am living in Estonia, a middle-aged woman who wants to go on holiday with her family. I ask, “Where should I go? I like this and this and this.”
Does it actually mean that people will no longer decide for themselves — that nations will face a new kind of challenge because decision making is being handed over to AI?
And if so, will the competition between countries become purely fact based and even more intense as a result?
José: It’s a good question. Some of those answers, of course, I cannot give. It is a philosophical conversation, of course. From my perspective, I think the way people will use this intelligence might actually be better than the world we have been living in — especially in terms of disinformation on social media and so on.
So, in a way, it’s a filter. I know, like I said before, AI is often a lot of nonsense. The way it responds, it sometimes invents things or goes off track.
But I am not saying that this will always happen, okay? It can also be very dangerous. As you know, the development of AI is very expensive, and in the future, it will likely be controlled by only a few companies that have the resources.
So we need to be careful about who owns the AI and what agenda sits behind it.
But if you are looking for information about a country, for example, let me put it this way — I have three small kids. If I were to think about how I want them to search for information, although I do not let them do it yet because I want them to develop critical thinking, I would still prefer that they search using AI instead of a search engine or social media.
Because many of the things they might find there are not good — things they should not see. So, with AI, there is already a kind of filter applied to the information being shown.
It is a technology that brings, I would not say principles, but a kind of etiquette in how it presents information. That creates a level of filtering.
So I think one important point is this interaction with AI, and the direction it is taking, might actually lead us to a better place.
There is so much disinformation, so much negativity out there — contributing to the global sense of depression we are living in right now.
We see that the world is sad and increasingly anxious.
And the younger generation, the one you were referring to, is very pessimistic about the future. They are more pessimistic than ever before.
This kind of pessimism has never existed to this extent — not even in much harder times in the past.
Ironically, the world has never been in a better place — more democracy, more distribution of income, more availability of healthcare, and so on.
This is the best stage we have ever been in — and yet, people do not believe it.
I am not saying the world is perfect. Of course not. But it has never been better than it is today, and people do not see that. That is due in large part to the kind of information they are consuming.
Where was I going with all this? What I mean is that these tools — AI and the way it delivers content — can help shift that narrative.
People want to receive information in a way that makes them feel more optimistic or that feels more relevant to them.
To summarize and finalize: you asked whether it is just going to be a facts-based model — that countries need to supply data to a platform people will use and trust.
And the answer to that is — I do not think so.
Of course, you have to provide the facts. But I believe it is much more sophisticated than that.
It is about continuing to curate the content and Digital Identity of the country.
And that is where Nation Branding 2.0 enters a new phase.
It is about making sure you supply the right kind of content that AI can use and articulate — but it is not just a question of facts.
The answer is: content, content, content.
Countries need to focus on content and need to focus on digital. That is the principle of Nation Branding 2.0.
Liina: If I may just add, one of the threats or risks we feel is that although we have always been a digital country — citizen centric and customer centric — we have always focused on the person behind the screen.
But now, with AI, the focus is shifting more toward the technology itself, as if the technology were the benefit.
I feel there is a risk that we might become too entangled in the technology, when in fact our aim is to focus on and impact the person behind the screen.
That is where Soft Power and Nation Branding can really help — to make sure we stay focused on our Central Idea and on how we are different, and what value we offer to the world.
Clare: And it feels like that is the perfect conclusion to a conversation which, inevitably — given that we had two experts in the room — became philosophical. But we have come back to the core purpose of Nation Branding, which is focusing on people and focusing on core values.
So, thank you very much for the fascinating conversation. And thanks for joining us, Liina Maria from Enterprise Estonia, and José.
Good to have you again. We look forward to the next episode. Thank you everybody for listening.
José: Thank you.
Liina: Thank you.
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Published on 11.06.2025
