Tourism agencies must boost co-ordination

Viet Nam welcomed 6.8 million international visitors in 2012, bringing in nearly US$7 billion and marking a year-on-year increase of 13.86 per cent.
However, to successfully promote Viet Nam as one of the world's most exciting destinations in 2013, funding must be increased and coordination among government agencies and tourism marketing businesses must be improved.
Viet nam News reporters Bich Huong and Thu Huong spoke to the experts.
What can we do to improve our tourism marketing strategies in 2013?
Le Tuan Anh, director of Tourism Marketing Development Department, Viet Nam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT).
Based on our research, we plan to target major markets such as Russia and Japan. In the context of the economic slowdown, domestic tourists will also see increased promotions. More e-marketing initiatives will be applied.
The promotional programme bears the slogan "Viet Nam: Timeless Charm." The administration aims to be proactive in developing different activities for various budget scenarios.
In the last few years, the tourism sector has made up an increasingly high proportion of the country's GDP, demonstrating its growing role in the national socio-economic development.
However, the economic slowdown and cuts in public spending also affect the budget for tourism promotion.
Insufficient funding has made promotional activities difficult to organise, meaning relevant authorities and agencies must work closely together to find ways around the small budget. One point I want to emphasize is that tourism needs to be continuously promoted to ensure a steady flow of visitors in the long term.
Ha Van Sieu, director of the Institute for Tourism Development Research
Clearly, any tourism marketing efforts must catch the attention of the public. South Korean travel firms have produced tourism clips about Viet Nam that were considered quite effective, demonstrating that our own agencies and firms have not been as effective as they can in this area.
Tourism marketing is not just about delivering information and presenting enticing images. It is also about bringing in a return on investment. Additionally, there should be better co-ordination between the VNAT and businesses in terms of tourism marketing, so that businesses can help with issues like the lack of funding.
Kai Partale, tourism sector coordinator, Environmentally and Socially Responsible Tourism Programme (funded by the EU)
Marketing needs to be highly targeted to specific niches. Every market has different preferences in terms of what they want from a holiday in Viet Nam. Some people are more interested in culture or nature-based activities. So, you're basically communicating different messages to the targeted markets.
The objective needs to be clear. It's important to spread messages to the market that are consistent, like a "branded" message. There has been not much consistency in the brand, yet. The brand has rather been seen as a logo only. But the brand is almost like your personality. It needs to be reflected in anything that you communicate into the market, from the images to the text fonts. Under the "Viet Nam: Timeless Charm," you have the option to develop product lines such as culture, coast, nature, and city breaks, which address the timeless charm.
Tran Nhat Hoang, manager of the Culture, Sports and Tourism Promotion Centre, Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism
In 2009, a communication campaign to promote tourism in Viet Nam to the international community kicked off with advertisements on taxis in London. Then, advertising efforts expanded to underground stations in Japan, the Premier League stadium in UK and buses in Sydney, Australia. Each year, many foreign film crews come to Viet Nam to produce documentaries, spreading the country's image around the world.
I want to affirm that tourism promotion costs a lot and the results cannot be seen in a few days. It is a long-term investment. It's hard to estimate how much money is enough. The question is how to make promotional campaigns effective and reach as many people as possible with such a limited budget.
*How can we encourage the private sector to get involved in national tourism marketing efforts?
Tuan Anh: The average yearly State budget for tourism promotion is about US$1.5-2 million and mostly comes from the fund for the National Tourism Action Programme and National Tourism Promotion Programme. Localities and enterprises also supply funds for these activities.
Over the last decade, these resources have been divided along with the responsibilities that accompany them. National agencies are responsible for promoting the national image, while local agencies are responsible for introducing their own localities and enterprises are responsible for introducing and promoting their tourism products and services.
As public spending is reduced, central State promotion agencies play a key role in identifying markets and co-ordinating resources; local promotion agencies and enterprises can make use of these findings to develop tourism products.
If they see support from State agencies, enterprises will be more willing to work with them.
Partale: Governments usually play a leading role in designing and financing national campaigns and benefit from increased tourism revenues when numbers increase; however, effective management of the private sector is essential to ensure follow-up and sales as awareness is raised. Clear and regular communication channels with the private sector need to be created, such as forums to explain proposed campaign opportunities.
The Government should take the leading role in promoting the country. The private sector needs to adapt to the national brand and carry on the messages that the national administration is communicating through their promotional tools.
Hoang: A partnership between the public and private sector can produce fruitful results in almost all fields. The appointment of Ly Nha Ky as the first Viet Nam Tourism Ambassador last year demonstrates the effectiveness of such co-operation, as she personally helped many of her acquaintances - including businessmen - learn more about Viet Nam. The successful campaign "Vote for Ha Long Bay" also proved the marketing power of the business community.
When logos promoting Vietnamese tourism were placed on billboards in Britain, we called on Vietnam Airlines to launch a promotional campaign at the same time. Once people learn about Viet Nam, they should be informed about how to get to the country and how much it costs.
The participation of businesses in this process is crucial. The quality of their tourism services and products determines whether guests return to the country. Those who are satisfied with the service they receive can spread the word about Viet Nam as a tourism destination, but if they are not satisfied, this can dissuade others from visiting the country.
Sieu: Businesses will only participate in tourism marketing if they see there is a clear benefit to them. So we must make sure national tourism marketing campaigns also promote the products and services of businesses.
For example, the "I (Heart) New York" tourism campaign provided shares of its revenue to participating businesses. In the case of "Viet Nam: Timeless Charm," we must make clear that businesses that contribute funding to national campaigns to promote the "timeless charm" brand can see financial benefits.
We have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on tourism promotion clips for international channels such as CNN and BBC. Do you think these are effective enough?
Tuan Anh: Budget plays an important role in making tourism promotion clips as well as getting them to the target audience. However, this doesn't necessarily mean that big budgets create the most impressive clips, or that low-budget clips cannot reach as many viewers.
Rather than money, the key to creating a successful advertisement is choosing the right media outlet. We have already placed advertisements on well-known international and domestic channels. These are expensive but reach many people. Now, we have started making use of online social networks. More and more people are now joining social networks. With these networks, anyone who visits Viet Nam can be a marketer for the country. This type of marketing creates an impact very quickly and is more economical than traditional forms of advertising.
Partale: Expensive marketing efforts don't always reach their desired audience. When you advertise on mass media such as CNN and BBC, your ads are seen by many people, but how many of them will travel to Viet Nam?
It's important to identify the most relevant media and continuously studying their profiles, such as audited viewership numbers, viewer's socio-economic status, activity preference, interest profiles.
You need to have a consistent message that you are broadcasting, rather than advertising on an ad-hoc basis. Continuity can really have an impact on the audience. Nowadays, Internet marketing can be much more effective. It's an individual-targeted approach. When you look at the existing tourism websites, they are often uninteresting and outdated.
There are also opportunities in social media such as guerrilla marketing, where you create attention which becomes viral on the Internet through very unconventional kind of messages that get picked up on Youtube or Twitter.
Hoang: When we advertise on big-name channels like CNN and BBC, these ads are worth the money as they reach many people, ensuring the success of promotional campaigns. We also avoid scattered investment. In the current economic situation, e-marketing is an affordable and effective means of tourism promotion.
Thanks to advanced technology, we can divide potential customers into groups and then tailor our message to each group. It's not necessary to give everyone all the information we have. Instead of offering general information, we can provide specific information related to the interests of each market segment.
For example, Russian visitors usually enjoy sea tourism, so we can show them how beautiful Viet Nam's sea is and how they can explore it. Meanwhile, investors should be provided with information about promising businesses, opportunities for investment and attractive policies.