Vietnam to hire consulting firm for tourism marketing

Vietnam will for the first time hire a consulting firm to work out a comprehensive marketing plan for its tourism industry during the 2011-2015 period, Nguyen Van Tuan, director of the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT), told Tuoi Tre in an exclusive interview.

It is expected to choose Cowan Vietnam Limited Company, which has recently won the first prize in a contest to design a new logo and slogan for Vietnam’s tourism sector, as the consultant agency, Tuan said.

The Southeast Asian country is consulting experts, tourist agencies, ministries, and local news agencies about the slogan ‘Vietnam – A Different Orient” and then will submit it together with the new logo to the government for approval prior to using those in their promotion campaigns from now on, according to the director.

VNAT is now preparing a proposal to promote local tourism from now to 2015, Tuan said, elaborating it will ask the government to earmark a 70 billion dong (US$3.4 million) budget for this year’s marketing activities, a 70 percent increase over last year’s $2 million.

It has also proposed the central government and the Ministry of Finance extract $1 out of the revenues earned from each visitor, which could then total up to a $5 million to contribute to the fund, he added.

This should be a profitable investment since experts say one dollar dedicated to marketing activities in tourism would yield $12-15, Tuan believed.

The administration will intensively direct its promoting campaigns to such markets as Japan, China, South Korea, Taiwan, ASEAN, Western Europe, North America, Russia, and Australia, he revealed.

Tuan admitted that the tourism industry previously did not effectively utilize marketing.

VNAT is now asking for more empowerment to improve the situation.

Vietnam received 5 million international arrivals last year, up 19 percent compared to its 4.2-4.5 million target and an increase of over 30 percent from 2009, he said.

Domestic travelers topped 28 million and revenues reached 96 trillion dong ($4.6 billion), up 20 percent from the industry’s target.

Those growth statistics are too hot, he thought.

Vietnam’s tourism industry has set a target of 5.3-5.5 million international visitors to the country and expects to serve 30-31 million domestic travelers this year, which is estimated to bring 110 trillion dong (US$5.3 billion), or 4.6 percent of the nation’s GDP.

Tags: tourism marketing