**11.2 Rural destination branding strategies**

The focus of this section is derived from **Table 5** as part of the components to develop a rural tourism destination brand framework as depicted in **Figure 1**. Analyses of data on destination branding strategies in **Table 5** produced eleven strategic themes: understanding branding and description of rural tourism destination brand; rationales for rural tourism destination brand; roles of tourism attractions in rural destination brand development; strategic stages of destination brand building; challenges of developing a destination brand; and managing the challenges of destination brand building. Other branding strategies are critical success factors (CSFs); strategies for the implementation and monitoring of CSFs; destination brand influence and tourist destination of choice; destination brand benefits; and destination management and monitoring.
