DOT spends $4 million for RP promotional ads in China, Korea and Japan

By Ronron
February 23, 2005

Cebu – The Philippines’ department of Tourism (DOT) allotted $4 million dollars (or over P200 million) for promotional advertisements about the country in Greater China, South Korea and Japan which are in lieu of the ads shown in the past years in the Cable News Network (CNN).

This was revealed recently by Tourism Secretary Joseph “Ace” Durano, explaining that there is a need to aggressively promote the Philippines in these so-called short-haul sources over the more-sensitive countries like Europe.

“Last month, we started coming up with television and print advertisements in Japan, Greater China and Korea. It cost us $4 million for these three markets, for the entire year. And these ads are in Japanese, Chinese and Korean, so that the people in these places can really understand the ads,” Durano told reporters here last Monday.

Japan, South Korea, Mainland China, Taiwan and Hongkong have been regarded by DOT as the primary markets considering that 60% of the foreign tourists who arrived in the Philippines last year came from these countries.

European countries and the rest of the Asia Pacific, meanwhile, were categorized as secondary markets in the agency’s campaign efforts since they only account for the lesser percentage of the two million foreign tourists who visited the Philippines in 2004.

Durano disclosed that the promotional ads about the Philippines that were shown internationally through CNN in the past years under the term of then Tourism Secretary Richard Gordon have already been pulled out.

“We did not renew our contract with CNN because we had to change our marketing strategy. The ads on CNN were in English. And these could not be understood by the Chinese, Japanese and Korean tourists. Our advertisements should be in the Japanese, Chinese and Korean languages. That’s why we had to go directly to each of these countries,” Durano explained.

Durano said that the new television and print ads are tailored to the agency’s main marketing strategy, which is promoting the Philippines as a brand. “The advertisement shows a summary of how beautiful the Philippines is,” he said.

The concentration of the DOT’s promotional activities in these markets, however, is not only due to the arrival statistics factor but also has something to do with the existing global threat of terrorism.

“We are concentrating our promotional activities in what we call as short-haul markets, namely South Korea, Hongkong, Japan, Taiwan and China because they are not as sensitive as the European and North American markets in terms of terrorism threats, which is a global reality,” the tourism secretary said.

It can be recalled that the United States, United Kingdom, Australia and Canada recently issued travel advisories on the Philippines following the separate bombings last February 14 in the cities of Makati, Davao and General Santos.

Durano said the terror threat is always incorporated in the agency’s planning.

“The Philippines always suffer every time we are pictured out negatively in the international media, such as in Japan. That’s why we have to get longer air time there, and we have to show the beauty of our country using their own dialect,” he pointed out. A DOT press release stated that the ads in Japan build on the image of the Philippines as “Premium Resort Islands” since studies showed that the words “resorts” and “islands” generate a positive image in the minds of Japanese tourists.

The approach being used for China, on the other hand, is such that the ads will educate the Chinese about the Philippines. “China is a new market. Last year, we had about 40,000 Chinese tourists. But they don’t know much about the Philippines. They want to know what they can do here. So we have to educate them,” Durano said.

In the case of South Korea, Durano said it is necessary to promote further the Philippines there through these ads in spite of the increasing number of Korean tourists here to be able to sustain the market. The marketing program in Korea uses the slogan “Feel The Islands,” a phrase derived from “Burinara,” a popular word in Korea.

Along with these efforts is the campaign intended for the North American Balikbayan market and the domestic market as well, tagged “I Love Philippines! Biyahe Na!”

“The goal of the DOT is to create demand for the Philippines. This is the way to bring in tourists,” said Durano, who aims to bring in 2.668 million tourists for this year, and five million in the next five years./DMS