Marketing Abstract

Ugh..

After leaving all my articles locked up in my inacessible office (BPU is closed due to a three-day weekend) I had to kind of fake the rest of my abstract together as today was the deadline for application. This is what I get for dicking around. It isn't what I wanted, but down below is what I sent in. As soon as I hit the "send" button I regretted including the final paragraph - it is trying to do too much and I'm not sure it is as relevant as it could be. Also, the "research" I mention is barely begun so if I'm accepted there will be a shitstorm of emailing and computering to do.....

Oh well...

----------------------------------------------------
International Tourism Opportunities in Korea: Opportunities for Autocatalytic Emergence

This paper will discuss Korea’s increasing tourism deficit in the context of international brand-creation and the particular opportunities that Korea’s current lack of brand gives the nation. The United Nations World Tourism Organization (2006) calculates that in 2003 International tourism accounted for roughly 6 per cent of exported international goods and services (as measured in U.S. Dollars). When focusing exclusively on service exports, this number jumps to an astounding 30 per cent. Korea, unfortunately, has not been able to take advantage of this market.

According to data from the Korea Tourism Organization (2008), Korea’s tourism deficit not only continued to climb as Korea entered 2008, but it topped $10 billion (on an annual basis) in 2007. Korean travelers overseas spend $15.8 billion dollars while foreign visitors to Korea spent a mere $5.7 billion dollars. This problem is not a recent one, although its scope has dramatically increased (As recently as 2004, the deficit was a ‘mere’ $3.8 billion). Worse, Korea’s market share of Asian-Pacific tourism has been dropping. From 1990 to 2005 Korea was one of only three Asian Pacific countries to lose market share (Mongolia, which is statistically nonexistent, and Indonesia were the other states), going from 7.7% of the region to 4%. (UNTWO, 2006)
This problem has not escaped the notice of Korean politicians, policy-makers, and those in the tourist-dependent industries. New Korean President Lee Myung-bak has promised, “We can no longer leave domestic tourism unattended. I will come up with measures to develop the tourism industry into a future growth engine of our economy.” These promises follow on several decades of similar promises that have been without successful issue.

This deficit is the result of a handful of historical and social realities. First, Korea has not forged an international brand. Attempts at branding have been inconsistent at best, frequently having little or no impact on potential tourists. Part of the difficulty in effective branding stems from a deficit in, or perhaps a lack of, appropriate market research. Lacking understanding of what potential tourists desire, Korea is consequently unable to develop campaigns, symbols, slogans, or even advertisements, that appeal to foreigners. The inconsistent nature of Korean branding has left Korea with no ‘image’ in the international community. In comparison to neighboring countries, Korea is an international unknown. Secondarily, Korea has not fully addressed what Gi-Wook Shin (2003) calls its “paradox of globalization.” That is to say it has not fully reconciled its desire to extend itself to the entire globe with its sometimes contending desire to remain homogenous.

Using a theoretical framework borrowed from Gunn (1988), particularly focusing on notions of ‘organic’ and ‘induced’ images of potential tourist destinations, this paper will discuss some aspects of Korea’s historical inability to achieve appropriate international tourism results as well as the startling opportunities that this now leaves for Korea. Some of this discussion will center on original research which indicates that Korea has an undefined international brand and has sometimes misjudged its market’s tastes. This research includes a survey of travel-agencies, analysis of Korea’s position in “image-making” travel publications, and surveys and interviews with Korea-bloggers (that is, people who have extant knowledge of Korea).

With no existing international image, Korea finds itself in a rare position – it is first in line at its own palimpsest. Korea has an opportunity to create the initial conditions for the autocatalytic emergence of its own international tourist brand and success. These opportunities are focused around 8 related initiatives that can be loosely grouped into three categories:

BRANDING
• Branding Korea.
• Staying on focus.
• Involving citizens of targeted countries in developing branded materials.

IMAGE PROPAGATION
• Working with overseas ‘destination makers’ to extend the brand.
• Promoting Cultural Exchange at all levels of culture, not just the academic.
• Focusing on two kinds of tourists – Tour based tourists and ‘seekers’.

DOMESTIC EXPERIENCE
• Creating a comfortable experience for international tourists who do visit Korea.
• Understanding that driving tourism is not just economic but also cultural.

Finally, this paper will briefly analyze other tourist destinations (e.g. Hawaii and Japan) that have been successful at creating linked organic and induced images that now function autocatalytically on the international level. By applying the lessons learned, it should be possible for Korea to reverse its unfortunate trend in balance of tourism.

Broken Rock in the Hot Sun ( I Fought....)

After an exhausting 5-day work week it was the start of what may be three consecutive three day weekends.

Dinner with TSR last night - a curry of brilliant provenance and, happily, three bottles of wine between the two of us. Or sadly, when I remember how I felt when I woke up this morning. ;-)


But the trip to the festival was delayed until 1:30 (and then another hour because Adam's kid was cranky) and that helped. The festival lasted until just after 8 and it was hot.. probably near 90 and, as usual, the "field" was sand and dried spit. Still, some very nice cultural acts, an Indian lunch that wasn't within miles of what TSR had prepared the night before, and some very nice chat with Adam, who I rarely see except in passing. His wife drove us and she has perfect English, although she rarely spoke.



The festival ended with an awesome fireworks display. It was set off not 100 metres from us and it blew the sky open. The bonus thing? As I'm goggling like the idiot that you all know I am at the magnesium-based, steel backboned sparklers of my youth (you know, the ones that give third-degree burns on contact?) Adam says, "oh yeah, you can buy fireworks in any major store. Year round."

Now, Koreans may pile up in the thousands to hold candle-light vigils against US beef (Hey, genius, just don't eat it if you don't like it) at the same time that fans and taxi drivers freely take lives all across the country. And that would be a point against..



But, dude... fireworks.. all year. And, really, no crime worth mentioning (which comes up as a draw when measured against the fact that drugs aren't available). And the price of the food...



Korea.. not "sparkling" - and, that evil looking Ralph-Steadmanesque thing on the left is the new fucking OFFICIAL "mascot" (if by mascot you mean that thing that, after getting up from its position as recently sodomized beast is probably going to kill you) of Seoul - but pretty darned cool..



I mean really.. a fucking horned lion... drawn in random circles and inkblots.

Is there anything Korean Marketing can't fail?

It's Factual and Abstractual!

First draft of the abstract for Fukuoka... feel free to savage it...

International Tourism Opportunities in Korea:
Opportunities for Autocatalytic Emergence

The United Nations World Tourism Organization calculates that in 2003 International tourism accounted for roughly 6 per cent of exported international goods and services (as measured in U.S. Dollars). When focusing exclusively on service exports, this number jumps to an astounding 30 per cent.

The picture in Korea is not so rosy.

According to data from the Korea Tourism Organization, Korea’s tourism deficit not only continued to climb as Korea entered 2008, but it topped $10 billion (on an annual basis) in 2007. Korean travelers overseas spend $15.8 billion dollars while foreign visitors to Korea spent a mere $5.7 billion dollars. This problem is not a recent one, although its scope has dramatically increased (As recently as 2004, the deficit was a ‘mere’ $3.8 billion). Worse, Korea’s market share of Asian-Pacific tourism has been dropping. From 1990 to 2005 Korea was one of only three Asian Pacific countries to lose market share (Mongolia, which is statistically nonexistent, and Indonesia were the other states), going from 7.7% of the region to 4%.

This problem has not escaped the notice of Korean politicians, policy-makers, and those in the tourist-dependent industries. New Korean President Lee Myung-bak has promised, “We can no longer leave domestic tourism unattended. I will come up with measures to develop the tourism industry into a future growth engine of our economy.” These promises follow on several decades of similar promises that have been without successful issue.

This deficit is the result of a handful of historical and social realities. First and foremost, Korea has not forged an international brand. Attempts at branding have been inconsistent and ineffective, frequently having little or no impact on potential tourists. Part of the difficulty in effective branding stems from a deficit in, or perhaps a lack of, appropriate market research. Lacking understanding of what potential tourists desire, Koreans are consequently unable to develop campaigns, or even advertisements, that appeal to foreigners. The inconsistent nature of Korean branding has left Korea with no ‘image’ in the international community. In comparison to neighboring countries, Korea is an international unknown. Secondarily, Korea has not fully addressed its “paradox of globalization.” That is to say it has not fully reconciled its desire to extend itself to the entire globe with its sometimes contending desire to remain homogenous.
This paper will discuss some aspects of Korea’s historical inability to achieve appropriate international tourism results as well as the startling opportunities that this now leaves for Korea. With no existing international image, Korea finds itself in a rare position – it is first in line at its own palimpsest. Korea has an opportunity to create the initial conditions for the autocatalytic emergence of its own international tourist brand and success. Unusually, Korea has this opportunity at both the level of Gunn’s “organic” and “induced” images.

These opportunities are focused around 10 related initiatives that can be loosely grouped into three categories:

Branding

• Branding Korea.
• Defining Korea as a “new” or “trendy” destination.• Defining Korea as “different” but imaginable.
• Staying on single focus over time.
• Involving citizens of targeted countries in creating marketing materials.

Image Propagation

• Working with travel agents, travel magazines to take this message ‘home’ to overseas markets.
• Promoting Cultural Exchange at all levels of culture, not just the academic.
• Focusing on two kinds of tourists – Tour based tourists and ‘seekers’.

In-Country

• Creating a comfortable experience for international tourists who do visit Korea.
• Understanding that driving tourism is not just advertising hotels or destinations but is making a culture attractive.

By analyzing other tourist destinations (e.g. Hawaii and Japan) that have been successful at creating linked organic and induced images internationally, and applying the lessons learned, it should be possible for Korea to reverse the unfortunate trend in it’s balance of tourism.

Away Blogger

I have been very away recently.. what with all the writing for hire and actual travel. But the BAG, in a display of shocking efficiency, went out and got a temporary job that started the day after the xmas shut-down of her job at the college! And it pays a bit more. Someone should watch that chick, she may be getting it. ;-)

In celebration we went out for sushi and sitting there came across a new sake product. I swiped the table-tent which advertised it and it is scanned here for someone's delectation. First thing I noticed is that this is definitely not aimed at men. As I gazed at its overwhelming bubbly pinkness I could feel a nascent set of ovaries developing, way deep down in my body somewhere I couldn't exactly place. I quickly swigged some of my beer and belched. I'm sure the Japanese characters on the label say something like "girly-man."
I am impressed, however, by the phrase "Sparkling Flower" (although it really should be used to name a firework, not some girly Japanese hooch) and will add it to my list of silly nicknames.

On the other side was this odd layout. I wasn't sure why any self-respecting firm would give their product a "Sake Meter Value" negative rating, but there it is, the "-60". A bit of research indicates this means it is a sweet Sake, but I might take that "Value" out of there. It has multiple meanings. Semi-bad marketing.

Then again there is also the "serve chilled for maximum refreshment" which is often times a warning that if your taste buds aren't frozen, you really won't like the thing.

The remaining bits off the label, the Japanese characters, are semi-traditional stuff: Threats to "get back at the US" for WWII and several lines from an old lease to Dokdo Island.

I wonder if anyone orders this stuff?

I BELEIVE!

Now...

if you are advertising your brilliant way to build wealth you just might want to use a spellcheck..




And make sure your site displays properly



Cause otherwise? It might be clear you're not gonna help be get rich...

I'm not sure I want to be my degree online.
Partly because I don't know what it means..

Dude - I'd Like to Help, but Your Name...

Is "Dudu."




And you really don't look hungry, more like you're stoned.

This advert just doesn't sell the message.

So I guess your ass is gonna starve.....

Korean Marketing Fails Again

While I was in the lovely town of Colfax I saw something that bugged the marketer in me. I’ve repetitively blogged about how shitty Korea is at promoting itself, but in a small (and new) restaurant in Colfax I saw more living proof.

The lovely BAG and I sat down for dinner. On the table was a two-sided menu of drinks. All of which featured something I might never have heard of before, “Han Asian Vodka.”

But I had heard of it before at a joint down in Big City. A Thai place (Hint: not Korean) where they served a lovely drink called a “Han Solo.” Lo and behold, on this small-town menu, I saw the same drink. And a whole host more, which you can see on the graphics Terrifying Teefs and Dangerous Digits courtesy of the BAG).

I saw that this whole setup had to be engineered by the “Han Asian Vodka” Company. Once is a coincidence, twice is an attempt at branding.

…… and for christ’s sake I can’t even type that shit… “Han Asian Vodka” is Soju. Good old Korean Soju and yet here it was.. starting to creep into a niche, but without its real name.. So I went and talked to the bartender, who also turned out to be the owner.

I asked her if she was ‘featuring’ the whole “asian vodka” thing because it allowed her to, without a hard-liquor license, make mixed drinks (like a “hangarita”) without having to resort to wine. I knew the answer was “yes” but I wanted to find out how she had come to do this thing. After some chitchat she me that the whole thing had been presented to her as a marketing package by the folks at “Han.”

I asked, “well you know that it’s just soju, but it’s not even from Korea?”

She told me I was wrong and pulled out the bottle, “see, it is soju from Korea, but it is bottled and distributed in Taiwan.”

And I just about had a stroke, because once again I was face to face with a massive, hideous, total, and moronic, failure of Korean marketing.

Soju is “vodka” in the sense it is fermented and prepared that way. But its alcohol content is slightly above that of wine, and thus just fits in with the “soft” alcohol category of the ABC in California. Therefore, with it’s vodka-like taste (it reminds me of The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. Soju is “a beverage not completely unlike vodka.” Look it up, pointdexter!) it is the perfect “soft” booze to make drinks that “hard” drinkers like to order. At the very least, it can tart up a drinks menu that could previously only feature beer and wine.

But it took a TAIWANESE company to figure this out and to prepare an entire marketing campaign, with drink names and recipes included, for bars in the United States. They not only bothered to figure out what the US wanted (A thing Korean marketers are constitutionally incapable of) but the found the solution (heh, that’s a soju joke!) in Korea and created an integrated marketing plan around it.

Of course the Taiwanese didn’t call their product “Soju,” instead they renamed it “Han Asian Vodka” and thus the essential Korean nature of the drink is erased from it. Korea will never reap an iota of benefit from this.

The name, BTW, is clever, for Koreans will read the “han” and believe it is in reference to the Korean people. They will believe this, of course, because they know nothing about the United States and would never think that 19 our of 20 US citizens would identify the word “Han” as having to do with China and would never once think about Korea as part of “asia.”

But when the news of this gets back to Korea? Somewhere, in some obstructed bowel of some governmental building in Seoul, some guy in a tailored suit and snappy tie will exchange congratulations with other similar factoti, about how the “Korean Wave” continues to cover the world.

In reality? A brilliant marketing opportunity (similar to how Korean BBQs in the US don’t pump their .. well… their BARBEQUE!) was lost to Taiwan.

Stupid Korean marketers!

The Mighty Power of Branding.. Apples by McDonalds Taste Better

so this here link.. leads to a study in the Houston Chronicle which points out that "carrots, milk and apple juice tasted better to the kids if it was wrapped in the familiar packaging of the Golden Arches."

So there you go, the mighty and untrammeled power of branding is actually changing how things taste to the kiddies.

I'm not sure if this is good or bad, it does seem to border on stupid, but it certainly shows why even a community college might want to develop a solid brand. Suppose you are McDonald's University and a student can't get in your class? Well, duh, that's because everyone wants to sit in those McDonald's classes. If you can't get into the same class at good old Swamp Valley College? The idiots at SVC didn't schedule enough sections. Gee, I wish I could go to McDonald's University - even the apples taste better there. ;-)

now.. NOW the checks can come pouring in!

I received a rather bulky parcel in the mail today and it turned out to be my Diploma!

Now I am the Master of My Own Domain, or something very much like it..

Turns out I got my thesis ok'd in time to graduate as of "the fifteenth day of July, 2007."

I suppressed a momentary urge to go out and get a beer, and watched a Simpson's episode instead. The BAG was going to come over tonight, but her suicidal move into the ghetto was not quite complete, so she switched to tomorrow night. Alas, it would have been a bit more of a celebration had she been around.

I suppose this really means that I could head to Korea at any time I want, now. Conversation at work revolves around the 'threat' that the chancellor is going to come and sweep us all out of our positions (well, not me, as I'm classified - and leaving anyway). This would be perverse in the way that all CC decisions are perverse. After all, for over a year (since the new management team landed) we have grown beyond all expectations, including dwarfing the growth of our sister college who, by all rights, should be swamping us.

but the paranoid logic goes something like this:

No good deed goes unpunished, and as our chancellor intends to make his statewide career off of his work at Swamp Valley College District, he needs to make the district "his." We are in one of those states exploding with young Hispanics, and the issue of the next few decades is going to be how to give access to this population. The chancellor, therefore, will need to make SVC a Hispanic Serving Institution and then claim an expertise that can move up to the statewide scale. This is certainly believable because the chancellor, while very effective, is also remarkably self-serving (at this level all adminstrators are). So far so good, but I am just naive enough to wonder why this would necessitate a wholescale elimination of management.

Our deans, certainly, have been indolent to the point of coma. Much of the growth we have accomplished has been with me cast in the role of Cassandra (at first) waving sheaths of paper in the air and yelling "I can predict what sections we can fill, if we would only open them!" But even the somnolent deans (well, most) have seen the reality of this and now when I look at local demos and past rosters they grudgingly listen and open (albeit at a fearfully conservative pace) new sections. Which fill. So we should grow. That I am doing the research and suggestion is reason enough to fire all the deans.

On the student-services side, all is not perfect, but all is way better than it was two years ago, and although there is deadwood it needs pruning not uprooting. The paranoids point to the fact that we have already had two new administrators come in who are Hispanic. Pointing out that they replaced two Hispanic departees is for naught.

Then there is the issue of academic inertia - it is hard to get rid of employees, even contract ones (primarily deans and administrators). Here at SVC everyone, with the exception of the anglos, has an ethnic identification that brings with it automatic local support. We have learned, in years past, that you let an employee go, and these ethnic identifications immediately conjure up support - and loud public support that the board really doesn't like to see. So the only way to force a contract employee out is to make their life so miserable that they want to leave. This is a fine line, however, as the threat of the "workplace atmosphere" suit always lingers in the air. And, indeed, SVCD has a longstanding and solid tradition of ex-employees winning lawsuits - sometimes retirement quality versions.

Instructors, of course, are protected by tenure and ultimately unimportant to chancellorial designs - not only that, they turnover at a glacial rate and only new-hires represent a way to change things. Classified are protected by union, and it is difficult to lay them off - certainly not in numbers that would constitute a re-organization. So one way or another it will come down to the contract admins, if change is to come.

I'll be interested in watching this play out. If I go and one other key person on the marketing team goes, the growth will certainly ratchet back a bit - the deans just haven't been pounded enough yet to be sensible. At that point, who knows? The re-org might come, heads might roll, and from very far away... say Korea.. I will point and laugh.

Pamphlets That I Never Opened

Include this beautiful one (which was also reproduced in Spanish)

Why I Love Mexican Advertising

Because any old advertisement about TV Repair might actually feature the shapely butt of a chick in a bikini.
Or, say you 're an auto dismantler?


I'd certainly attempt to dismantle it!