CHINA, one of the growth stars in a world of sluggish economies, has been a magnet for visiting foreign delegations in pursuit of investment and expanded trade.

From Hungary, Spain, Poland, Canada, the United Kingdom, South Africa and other points around the globe, they come to the world's second-largest economy, hoping to build positive images of themselves as progressive business partners. The hoopla that surrounds these trips begins to blur in the minds of reporters who habitually cover them.

In December, Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski made his country's first head-of-state visit to China in 14 years. Reporters in Shanghai were told to arrive 90 minutes in advance of a speech scheduled by Komorowski. What he said in remarks lasting only about 15 minutes wasn't particularly remarkable.

Invest in Poland, he said. "Poland should be seen as a gateway to the 500 million strong European market."

Reporters covering these events might be forgiven for feeling a bit blasé, if not numb, as one visiting delegation begins to sound like the next.

The tour lingo invariably centers on "strategic locations," "gateways to the broader market," "skilled work forces" and "strength in green technology." All the words that visiting delegations think the Chinese want to hear, were repeated over and over again.

I think many governments out to woo China, especially those in poor economic shape, should be careful in assessing how their promotional money is spent lest it be lost in a cacophony of banality.

I can still recall clearly one comment by a visiting businessman from Barcelona, the second-largest city in Spain, which trumpets itself as a center of "innovative" industries.

"China indeed has a good local market," said the head of Easy Innova, a firm working on artificial intelligence, virtual information and the Internet of the future. "But if you want to build up competitiveness, you have to try something different from what's offered by the United States."

His key message was that Europe needs to differentiate itself by offering something the US is either unable or unwilling to deliver.

Do homework

People familiar with the delicate Sino-US relations know that China has repeatedly urged the US to lift its restrictions on exports of higher-technology goods that China needs. That advice has been ignored. The US is treating China as something less than a full and true trading partner. That opens up opportunities for other nations. China needs technology and innovation, not to catch up with the US, but to develop its own industries and feed its 1.34 billion people.

After attending so many of these press conferences and national marketing campaigns, I think the best advice one can give to visiting delegations is to do their homework on the market they are wooing and think up some clever new way of promoting themselves in that market.

Simon Anholt, a British policy advisor on national branding, said a few months ago that Europe should stop wasting its money on propaganda.

He's right. What Europe should do, in my opinion, is to forget hackneyed presentations and give some explicit reasons why China can't afford to ignore that continent.

It's easy to justify the motivation behind the UK's branding campaign: London is going to host the Olympic Games this year, and the British want to grasp the opportunity of a sports spotlight to sell the nation's commercial advantages.

Sometimes, things just don't go to plan. Hungarian Minister of National Development Tamas Fellegi kicked off his country's promotional campaign in Shanghai on the very day when Hungary's debt rating was downgraded, giving his pitch a pale tone.

China keeps hearing that the eurozone crisis is slowly resolving itself. What we need to hear are some simple specifics about why investment in a particular country or industry overseas is a good deal for both sides.

Sometimes nations get a boost in their efforts from strange quarters.

New Zealand is one case in point. The "Lord of the Rings" movie series was a big hit in China, prompting many Chinese to visit the small South Pacific nation. There's also something honest about the slogan "100 percent pure New Zealand" when trying to market that nation's green credentials.

To stress its good relationship with China, New Zealand has smartly presented its "four firsts:" the first western country to support China's accession to the World Trade Organization, the first developed country to recognize China's status as a market economy, the first developed country to enter into free-trade negotiations with China, and the first to sign an agreement.

Clever but simple marketing worked. China's trade and investment partnership with New Zealand has strengthened rapidly in recent years. Politicians often lead trade delegations to China, figuring their status opens important doors. That works if you have a politician with charisma. It becomes a more tepid exercise if a politician is bland or, worse, uninformed about China.

New image

In terms of national branding, Holland is another example of success. Images of bicycles, windmills and tulips dispel any memories of the nation's somewhat sorry colonial past. Africa, on the other hand, is still saddled with images of civil war, poverty and famine.

I can't say China's nation-branding efforts are more successful than others. China's products are still considered cheap and low-tech in some countries, and Chinese people are often viewed as rude and unsophisticated.

There are no doubt many people abroad who still think of China as a nation of village factories where people survive on muscle power, not brains.

The successful Beijing Olympics in 2008 and the 2010 World Expo in Shanghai has helped lift China's profile as a modern nation.

Chinese cities like Beijing, Shanghai and Hangzhou, as well as various entities such as the Xinhua news agency, are launching campaigns in foreign countries to sell a new image of China. May they be more successful than what we have seen on parade here in Shanghai.