Rio de Janeiro
Buenos Aires
From Hashtag to Holiday
Throw out the old playbook
Forget slow-building reputations, these cities went viral.
Miami, Rio de Janeiro and Buenos Aires have risen to global prominence not through top-down tourism campaigns, but through bottom-up culture. Music videos, travel vlogs and social media have turned them into symbols of energetic lifestyle and expression for a new generation of travellers.
MIARanks fourth in Promise
RIORanks third overall in South American cities
BUERanks first in Sentiment Analysis
Can buzz become brand?
Miami is confident and built for visibility. Its luxury hotels, nightlife and art scene have made it shorthand for aspiration.
Rio is visually magnetic. Its energy and natural beauty create emotional highs, but infrastructure can interrupt the experience, limiting its potential impact.
Buenos Aires is a breakout star: authentic, emotionally rich and highly regarded for its quality of life and gastronomy. Visitors praise its heritage and neighbourhood warmth.
Fame meets follow-through
Viral fame can spark attention, but enduring brands are built on substance. These cities are learning to match the promise of their image with the strength of their reality.
Miami leads in infrastructure and global reach. Buenos Aires combines charm with solid delivery. Rio’s task is to turn admiration into consistency, scaling its magic without losing its soul.
Hype fades fast. Cities that invest in experience turn views into return visits.
What's next?
To sustain their rise, these cities must move from reactive to deliberate storytelling while strengthening infrastructure, refining service, and deepening the experiences that make their fame last beyond the feed.
Want to discover more?
With even more information and insights, it’s a whole lot more than pretty graphs (but plenty of those, too.)
Download the full reportRelated work from Saffron
Apart from investigating city brands, we make brands memorable across strategy, design and product.
