Digital marketing agency Code Computerlove has been appointed to promote the first ever Manchester Day celebrations.

Manchester Day will take place on 20 June and its centrepiece will be the Manchester Day Parade which it is hoped will create a carnival atmosphere throughout the city centre.

Organisers including Manchester City Council have appointed Code as the lead creative agency for the event, which will "celebrate what is fantastic about the city past and present, its heroes and its uniqueness".

The agency says details of its integrated marketing campaign are still being finalised but it is likely to include press, direct mail, online, outdoor, ambient and guerilla marketing activity. A viral campaign is also planned.

Code will introduce its work between now and June. The Manchester Day Parade website was created by Sass (now Mosquito) and is already live.

John Lander, group creative director of Code, said: "The Manchester Day Parade is all about capturing the imaginations of people from every corner of the city, who will join together with their thoughts, ideas and interpretations of what Manchester means to them and why it is a great place to live. It will celebrate the city, its people, its cultural diversity, its history and its vision for the future.

"As this is a new event for Manchester, the creative challenge for us was in giving the public a taste of the kind of extraordinary installation that the parade will be."

To help familiarise the people of Manchester with the event, the agency has created a series of colourful characters, dubbed the 'Ideables', who appear on the event's website and will feature in the marketing campaign.

"Our Ideables, as we have christened them, are a visual representation of the ideas and world-class creativity that can be found within the colourful and diverse people of Manchester," Lander said.

"Their colour, their quirkiness and charm is designed to heighten awareness levels and generate buzz before, during and after the event.

"As well as providing us with an engaging and recognisable launch vehicle that helps us to bring the future parade to life, we can use these characters in a limitless number of ways, in every form of media and at each and every stage of the customer journey."

Involving community groups, creative professionals and individuals, the parade will feature floats, music, dance, costumes and larger-than-life characters under the theme of 'out of this world'.