America's got a new tagline: "United States of Awesome Possibilities." The country's new positioning comes courtesy of the Corporation for Travel Promotion, which this summer hired JWT to handle a global marketing campaign and is worked with branding firm The Brand Union to create a logo for Brand U.S.A.

Perhaps it arrived too early for Turkey, which was following a soft power strategy of "zero problems with neighbors", accompanied by a restless army of exporters. Visa restrictions were lifted, trade boomed, and millions of tourists including the citizens of Iran and Syria poured into Turkey to see the places where popular Turkish TV series were shot.

Hosting the 2014 FIFA World Cup was supposed to provide an unalloyed boon to Brazil’s global image. Yet tournament preparations have highlighted many structural weaknesses in Latin America’s largest country, and predictions that the World Cup will deliver enormous economic benefits should be treated with skepticism.

Tourism, a buttress of the economy upon which an estimated 15 million people depend, remains in a tailspin. Desperate to reverse the trend, the tourism authority even test-marketed the uprising.

Japan has enlisted celebrities to reassure timid travelers that it’s safe to visit after the March 11 disasters triggered the nuclear crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi plant. But...with few visitors biting, the national tourism agency is looking to try a different tact that perhaps outshines the biggest of star power: Come to Japan…for free.

South Korea may be one of the fastest growing medical tourism destinations, but for now it lags far behind trailblazers Thailand, Singapore, India, Malaysia and even the Philippines.They all have their own distinctive marketing strategies in an attempt to woo clients, as well as areas of specialization.

Increasing tourism is a great goal, but the idea of kick-starting an economic recovery by attracting Asian shoppers to the United States to buy goods that are, for the most part, made in Asia doesn't sound all that sustainable.

He Tao ...said they have already started a major campaign to turn the city into a top international gastronomic center. This, he said, accords with the national strategy of using each city's soft power, but, of course, the city got a boost after it received the UNESCO's global gastronomy label.