How we defined the voice of Amsterdam tourism for a decade

For over 10 years, EdenFrost was the voice behind Iamsterdam: one of the world’s most famous tourism brands. Navigating countless stakeholders and a political presence, we content managed a website with over 15 million visits per year, and helped reshape the city’s image into what it is today.

Operated under city marketing organisation amsterdam&partners, iamsterdam.com is a portal site with several stakeholders and target groups. The website offers everything you need to know to visit, live, work, study and do business in the Amsterdam Metropolitan Area.

In 2008, our editorial manager was commissioned by the City of Amsterdam and Amsterdam Marketing to take on the role of head editor of the website. At that time, it was primarily a site for the municipal government to communicate civic information in English. Over the years, the organisations merged and the brief shifted along with it. From what was initially a request to help bring stakeholders and their content onto the same page, the project spanned the full spectrum - content strategy, production and social media.

Setting out a strategy for the editorial management and content production of such a complex site was only possible with close collaboration and transparency. Our agile, passionate team of writers, web editors, analysts and translators worked on-location and from the EdenFrost office with remote teams, agencies and developers. To maintain unity and efficiency, a dedicated project lead was assigned to each sector, and we implemented workflows and content management solutions that have been applied across both organisations.

Drawing from data and analysis, client input and years of experience, we planned and produced on-going and varied content. This included listicles, shareable video, select cultural agenda, civic information for international residents, and the latest business and startup news.

But our work went far beyond that of the written word – we also offered expert support and in-depth and technical CMS work, SEO strategy, keyword analysis, image editing, page templates, A/B testing, consultation and guidance, and successfully executed five complete site rebuilds.

Beyond the impressive stats – over four million unique views per month – the content we produced was top quality, inspiring, thoughtful and reflected the goals set out by amsterdam&partners. In 2019, we helped recruit and train a new in-house head editor to take over the role. We’ll always be proud of our role in making ‘I amsterdam’ a brand that is known, loved (and, to our amusement, copied!) around the world.

Find out more about our content strategy and copywriting services.