Country & city brand towards foreign students atraction: a comparative case study between Portugal/Lisbon and Spain/Madrid

In the beginning of the 21st century started to grow the idea of economic competitiveness linked to the identity and image of territories. In 2007, Anholt introduced the competitive identity concept, postulating that each place, regardless of its size or economic development, has unique characteristics that allow it to be competitive in niche markets. In addition, Anholt developed models of Hexagon to measure the image of coun-tries and cities. The City Brand Hexagon (2006; Anholt and Gfk 2015), that is used in this article, measures the cities ́ reputation regarding Presence; Local; Prerequisites; People; Pulse; Potential. This last parameter inclu-des the classification of places including study in higher education institutions. The other five criteria include assessments that are decisive in choosing the destination to study abroad. This article analysis the mobilization of the country and city brand to attract international students through a comparative case study between Portu-gal/Lisbon and Spain/Madrid that includes the observation of the official websites developed by these places to attract students from other countries, namely by checking which axes of the City Brand Hexagon are mobilized for this purpose. In addition, it is verified whether these sites, or other results, appear when introducing deter-mined terms of reference in Google.