Vietnam Tourism in lack of advertisement and marketing for development

Nhan Dan- Vietnam is now known as an attractive and safe destination in the region and is considered to have great potential for more development. However, the sector’s activities is still inefficient. This is due to the lack of professional marketing and advertisement.
Vietnam has not yet to set up a national tourism trademark. Even the current slogan “Vietnam-The Hidden Charm" is not powerful enough to attract visitors. Professor, Doctor L K Jago, director of the research centre of tourism and hotel of the Victoria University in Australia held that such a slogan is not clear and transparent so it would fail to attract international visitors. He took the example of other countries with more attractive slogan such as "Malaysia - Truly Asia" , "Uniquely Singapore" or "Incredible India".
Ms Ton Nu Thi Ninh, former vice chairwoman of the National Assembly’s Committee for External Affairs, shared the same view with Doctor Jago “the current slogan of tourism sector is not a clear message and doesn’t feature Vietnamese characteristics.
Images using for advertising the land and people of Vietnam is not impressive while souvenirs selling at shops are not unique.
It’s reported that the sector will spend around VND 16 billion (US $ 1milllion) in late months of the year on advertising tourism on international media. This is not the first time the sector has spent such an amount for the advertisement. However, the amount is unable to ensure the efficiency of advertisement.
Last October the image of Vietnam was broadcast on CNN for three months with a 30 second long clip. This cost US $30,000. However, it did not bring a high result as Vietnam’s potential tourists from the Republic of Korea, Japan and China did not see this English channel. While European audiences could not access the information as the it was broadcast on CNN for Asia.
Patrick Gaveau, marketing director of Focus Asia tourism company held that Vietnam tourism is still week in advertisement. “Strengthening image abroad is an active movement to attract international guests,” he said.
In the coming time, Vietnam will host many international events such as the ASEAN tourism forum 2009. This will be a good chance to advertise Vietnam image to international friends.