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Proceedings of the Second Asia-Pacific Conference on Global Business, Economics, Finance and Social Sciences
(AP15Vietnam Conference) ISBN: 978-1-63415-833-6
Danang-Vietnam, 10-12 July, 2015 Paper ID: VL515
1 www.globalbizresearch.org
Vietnam’s Tourism Branding
Tran Nhi Bach Van,
James Cook University, Australia (Singapore Campus).
E-mail: [email protected]
___________________________________________________________________________
Abstract
Tourism plays an important role in Vietnamese economy. Therefore, in tourism development
strategy of Vietnam destination (2020, vision to 2030), tourism is considered as leading
sector due to its magnitude impacts on economic, social and environmental aspects. The
objective of this strategy is to make Vietnam tourism sector into a developed one with
successful branding and high – quality tourism products by 2030. The key contents of this
strategy include seven sub-strategies about (1) tourism products, (2) infrastructure and
technical facilities for tourism, (3) human resource, (4) market development, (5) tourism
promotion and brands, (6) investment and policies for tourism development and (7)
international cooperation in tourism. Amongst, this paper is to examine the efficiency and
effectiveness of Vietnam tourism branding strategy. Accordingly, it focuses on three main
sections, including: branding strategy analysis; problems in building a strong brand for
Vietnam tourism; assessment and recommendation. Qualitative research method was
adopted through related document analysis to reach the aim of this paper.
___________________________________________________________________________
Key words: tourism branding, market development, Vietnam destination
Proceedings of the Second Asia-Pacific Conference on Global Business, Economics, Finance and Social Sciences
(AP15Vietnam Conference) ISBN: 978-1-63415-833-6
Danang-Vietnam, 10-12 July, 2015 Paper ID: VL515
2 www.globalbizresearch.org
1. Introduction
Nowadays, in a fierce competition of every country for the share of the world’s tourism
market, brand plays an essential part in marketplace. It helps the country distinguishable from
others. Also, branding element is fundamental to decision – making process of tourists as it
captures an image of core values of a destination (Rungo, 2011).
Reflecting back on case of Vietnam, it lies in the heart of South-East Asia, bordering
with China, Cambodia, Lao PDR, and East Sea. With the population around 89 million,
including 54 ethnic groups, Vietnam is known as the destination of marvelous history and
diversifying culture, such as: cuisine, traditional festivals and unique handicraft villages. In
addition, thanks to its diverse ecosystem, this country also attracts more and more tourist by
its natural heritages. According to Vietnam National Administration of Tourism, up to
present, Vietnam owns 10 World heritages, 30 National Parks and many other national
heritage sites (“Country Presentation”, 2012).
Despite its comparative advantages, Vietnam is not able to successfully compete in brand
positioning regionally and worldwide. According to Bloom Consulting (2013), Vietnam
tourism brand ranked 19th among Asian countries (Country Brand Ranking, 2013). In
addition, base on Bloom Consulting’s approach, Online Search Demand (OSD) is one of the
variables to measure the appeal of a destination to its potential customers. Among Asian
countries, Vietnam cannot be as attractive as, even left far behind its neighbors such as
Malaysia, Thailand, etc for this criterion. In term of Country Brand Strategy Ranking (CBS),
Vietnam’s position still is not high in the list (Country Brand Ranking, 2013). Thus, it can be
said that Vietnam still has a long way to reach its strategic goal of becoming a developed
tourism sector with successful brand by 2030.
In Vietnam, Ministry of Culture, Sport and Tourism functions to develop and promote
tourism sector. In addition, there is also another body named Vietnam Administration of
Tourism (VNAT). This organization, considered as Destination marketing organization
(DMO) in Vietnam, is a professional body under the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism,
performing the function of advising and assisting the Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism
on tourism services management in accordance with law. Specifically, this body is assigned
to be in charge with master plan, national promotion, action program, schemes and national
important projects on tourism. The studied strategy in this paper is developed by this
organization.
In tourism development strategy of Vietnam destination (2020, vision to 2030), there are
four main sections: (1) Perspective, (2) Objectives, (3) Solution and (4) Action plan. The first
section develops a general picture of Vietnam tourism in the future with sustainable and high
competitiveness. The second section defines both general and specific objective. In next
Proceedings of the Second Asia-Pacific Conference on Global Business, Economics, Finance and Social Sciences
(AP15Vietnam Conference) ISBN: 978-1-63415-833-6
Danang-Vietnam, 10-12 July, 2015 Paper ID: VL515
3 www.globalbizresearch.org
section, there are seven sub-strategy are developed to reach the goal by 2030, including (1)
tourism products, (2) infrastructure and technical facilities for tourism, (3) human resource,
(4) market development, (5) tourism promotion and brands, (6) investment and policies for
tourism development and (7) international cooperation in tourism. Amongst, when it comes
to branding positioning of Vietnam tourism in the future, VNAT places the focus on
developing tourism product brands, regional and local tourism brands as well as tourism
entrepreneur brands in order to promote national brand for tourism.
The purpose of this paper is to analyze Vietnam brand-building strategy plan.
Specifically, it examines the country’s current brand positioning, assesses the effectiveness of
the related policy and programs, such as selling proposition, marketing activities, human
dimension in brand-building. The structure of this paper is as follows: The first section
presents a brief literature review on tourism brand-building to support other latter parts of
discussion and evaluation of Vietnam Brand-building policy. The second section gives an in-
depth understand about the strategy of tourism brand-building of Vietnam. The third part
discusses some problems encountered by Vietnam brand. The last section will evaluate and
give recommendations in order to improve brand positioning for Vietnam.
2. Literature Review
Branding has become a popular marketing tool to promote the unique identities and
improved the competitiveness of a destination (Semone, 2011). Also, branding helps people
to differentiate and decide places they would like to visit. The notion of branding is defined as
a combination of a name, logo, slogan to identify the goods or service in markets, according
to Tasci & Kozak (2006) (cited in Gartner, 2014). However, building a brand does not mean
to appear with only logo and slogan. It is something dealing with country image in tourists’
minds. From a partially different perspective, Aaker (1996) states that a brand is associated
with functional, emotional, relational and strategic elements to sharpen the competitive
advantages. In addition, according to Hakimipour & Bozorgkho (2012), building a brand is
associated with some important factors, such as: advertisement, cultural heritages, public
awareness on symposium or conference, etc. In another study, Cai (2002) states that image is
the most important part of a destination brand. Besides, it also involves public awareness,
loyalty and quality of that destination (cited by Gartner, 2014).
There are some challenges that brand-building process encounters. First of all,
destination brand should fit its name and geographical features (Cai, 2002). Secondly, there
are variety of attributes, both tangible and intangible, relating to transferring a unified
message. Therefore, it is complicated to distill attributes and involved stakeholders while
keeping intact the core values of a destination (Buhalis, 2000). Thirdly, when a destination
identifies its brand, there is no guarantee that it will be accepted by everyone due to many
Proceedings of the Second Asia-Pacific Conference on Global Business, Economics, Finance and Social Sciences
(AP15Vietnam Conference) ISBN: 978-1-63415-833-6
Danang-Vietnam, 10-12 July, 2015 Paper ID: VL515
4 www.globalbizresearch.org
different needs from many different kinds of tourists. Besides, limited resources such as
marketing budget are also a challenge of brand-building (Morgan, Pritchard and Pride, 2002).
(cited by Cai et al, 2009).
In order to better deal with such challenges, Buhalis (2000) defines four tools. The first
one is the congruity between a brand’s strategies with a clearly defined target market. Also,
he focuses on stakeholder collaboration rather than competition among them. Fitting brand
with destination values, in terms of carrying capacity between physical and cultural elements
is also involved; and lastly, he mentions the stakeholders’ support for the vision of
development in that destination. In the same vein, Kotler and Gertner (2002) identify some
principles in building a brand. These include a catchy slogan visual images along with a
brand so that its image appears as appealing and distinguishable one; defining resources
forming a strong brand and effectively deploying them; unifying country's different local
branding by an umbrella concept; and creating special events to raise potential tourists’
awareness of destination’s images (cited by Cai et al, 2009).
So what makes a brand become successful? In the study of Morgan, Pritchard and Pride
(2005), a successful destination branding is featured with trust, quality and lifestyle
connotation that tourists can associate with. In addition, Zehrer (2007) places the importance
on brand management for effective use of resources to preserve and reinforce the core values
of a destination in order to stand out of the rest in a fierce competition among destinations
(cited by Semone & Kozak, 2011). Noticeably, not only branding activities like PR,
advertising, but also supporting elements such as financial and good conceptual planning
contributes to a successful branding (Semone & Kozak, 2011).
3. Vietnam Tourism Brand Strategy Analysis
Reflecting back on Vietnam, the current brand of Vietnam tourism is known as Vietnam –
Timeless Charm with a full blossom lotus as a logo, which is used for tourism promotion in
the period of 2012 – 2015. It symbolizes the everlasting beauty of the nation as well as
Vietnamese throughout the time. In addition, VNAT experts believe that such slogan is a
continuity of the previous one – Vietnam Hidden Charm, which was used in the period of
2008 – 2012, to further develop the brand. This new logo and slogan presents the brand
position of Vietnam which includes four main core values: Time, intensity, mystery and
commitment. In terms of time, Vietnam brand position attempts to identify Vietnam as a
destination where “time can stand till”. Intensity is about the variety of travel experience
from culture delights, natural wonders to city tours. Moreover, Vietnam’s brand sells the
image of exotic and authentic beauty of people, culture, etc. Also, brand position of Vietnam
is associated with a commitment of quality and friendly (“Vietnam Tourism Marketing
Strategy”, n.d).
Proceedings of the Second Asia-Pacific Conference on Global Business, Economics, Finance and Social Sciences
(AP15Vietnam Conference) ISBN: 978-1-63415-833-6
Danang-Vietnam, 10-12 July, 2015 Paper ID: VL515
5 www.globalbizresearch.org
Figure 1: Logo and Slogan of Vietnam tourism
(Source: Vietnam slogan and logo for tourism, n.d)
Besides, in the studied strategy, the national tourism brand is promoted on the basis of the
regional and local brands of tourism. Accordingly, the government will push ahead to
strengthen the coordination between localities as well as different sectors to construct and
develop tourism (“Strategy on Vietnam’s tourism”, 2011). Basically, there are seven zones
divided by geographic features to develop a tourism product system. In accordance with
branding strategy, there are four groups of brand products to be developed to meet the need of
different market segments:
(1) Culture;
(2) Coast;
(3) Eco – based;
(4) City – breaks.
(“Vietnam Tourism Marketing Strategy”, n.d).
Accordingly, localities’ brands will be developed in accordance with its tourism products
and therefore, contribute to develop national brand for tourism as a whole.
Table 1: Tourism Product System and Regional Brands
Area Provinces/cities Features Kind of tourism
1 Midland and mountainous
areas in North Vietnam
Lao Cai, Bac Kan,
Thai Nguyen, Cao
Bang, Tuyen
Quang, Ha Giang,
Lang Son and Bac
Giang, Hoa Binh,
Son La, Dien Bien,
Lai Chau, Yen Bai,
Phu Tho
Diversity of
ethnic
minorities’
cultural
identities
Eco-cultural tourism
2 Red River Delta and
coastal Northeast
Vinh Phuc, Thai
Binh, Ha Noi, Hai
Phong, Ha Nam,
Ninh Binh, Nam
Dinh, Quang Ninh,
Bac Ninh, Hai
Duong, Hung Yen
Wet rice
civilization and
local traditional
activities,
Sea sightseeing,
cultural tourism,
urban tourism,
MICE (Meetings,
Incentives,
Conferencing,
Exhibitions)
tourism.
3 North Central region Nghe An, Ha Tinh,
Thanh Hoa, Quang
Binh, Quang Tri
and Thua Thien-
Hue
World cultural
and natural
heritage sites
Marine tourism, eco-
tourism, historic-
cultural tourism
Proceedings of the Second Asia-Pacific Conference on Global Business, Economics, Finance and Social Sciences
(AP15Vietnam Conference) ISBN: 978-1-63415-833-6
Danang-Vietnam, 10-12 July, 2015 Paper ID: VL515
6 www.globalbizresearch.org
4 Coastal South Central
region
Khanh Hoa, Ninh
Thuan, Da Nang,
Quang Nam,
Quang Ngai, Binh
Dinh, Phu Yen and
Binh Thuan
Heritages,
marine culture
and cuisine.
Marine and resort
tourism, culture and
cuisine tourism.
5 Central Highlands Dak Lak, Dak
Nong, Kon Tum,
Gia Lai, and Lam
Dong
Unique cultural
values of
indigenous
ethnic groups
Eco-tourism and
cultural tourism
6 Eastern South Viet Nam Ba Ria-Vung Tau,
Binh Phuoc, Ho
Chi Minh, Dong
Nai, Binh Duong,
and Tay Ninh
Culture and
history
exploration
Urban tourism,
MICE tourism,
marine ecological
and resort tourism
7 Mekong Delta Hau Giang, Can
Tho, Long An,
Dong Thap, An
Giang, Soc Trang,
Ben Tre, Tra Vinh,
Vinh Long, Tien
Giang, Kien Giang,
Ca Mau, Bac Lieu
River life
culture, marine
ecological
features.
Eco-tourism, resort
tourism, and MICE
tourism
(“Strategy on Vietnam’s tourism”, 2011).
According to the above table, the center government has given the orientation for specific
areas to follow base on its natural and cultural features. Thus, the coordination in localities
plays an important role to promote a brand for the whole area in addition to each local brand.
Take Mekong Delta for example, this area is associated with river life culture and marine
ecology, which serves best to develop eco – tourism, resort and MICE tourism. However, this
area includes thirteen provinces/cities which have the similar geographical features.
Therefore, instead of severely competing between each province in this area, they should
collaborate and co – develop to promote the common tourism products for their branding. As
a result, an umbrella concept was developed by VNAT to cover and unify the country's
separate branding strategy activities in different localities. However, this strategy does not
mention how to cooperate and the level of cooperation so that each province can distinguish
itself among others to allure tourists.
In addition, following Buhalis’s (2000) principles about the congruity between a brand’s
strategy with a target market to promote the brand effectively, VNAT also clearly defines the
market segmentation matching with product brands, such as: North America tourists travel for
culture, coastal and mountain tourism while most North Asia tourists prefer city breaks and
special interests like MICE tourism, etc.
Besides, recognizing the essential role of public awareness in building and developing a
brand’ values (Gartner, 2014), in the strategy, VNAT implements a set of branding activities,
including: (1) Structure; (2) Legalities; (3) Financing; (4) Research and Analysis; (5)
Image/visuals; (6) Text; (7) Campaign (“Vietnam Tourism Marketing Strategy”, n.d). In
Proceedings of the Second Asia-Pacific Conference on Global Business, Economics, Finance and Social Sciences
(AP15Vietnam Conference) ISBN: 978-1-63415-833-6
Danang-Vietnam, 10-12 July, 2015 Paper ID: VL515
7 www.globalbizresearch.org
details, in addition with new logo and new slogan for tourism sector, the VNAT also did
research and analysis on target markets and segmentation to create proper tourism products.
Moreover, in the strategy, a clear financial budget needed was described to support branding
activities. In addition, VNAT has launched some oversea advertisements and campaign to
promote the new slogan for tourism. Specifically, there were Vietnam tourism roadshow in
Yaroslavl City, in Moscow (Russia); a program on strengthening tourism cooperation with
India, etc. The current approach adopted by VNAT to promote Vietnam tourism brand mostly
is marketing tools, such as PR, advertising and trade fairs. Unfortunately, it appears to be
insufficient in creating a strong brand for Vietnam tourism. According to Ritchie (2002),
there should be a move from promotion – oriented to a more holistic and strategic approach
on effective deployment of resources due to a changing trend in consumer behavior in order
to gain sustainable competitive advantage (cited by Bui & Perez, 2010).
4. Problems in Building a Strong Brand for Vietnam Tourism
No-one can deny the comparative advantages of Vietnam tourism. However, the
potentials cannot be commensurate with the development of that destination if lacking of
effective deployment. Although there have been a lot of brand-building efforts, Vietnam
tourism still appears unappealing brand and fiercely competes, especially with neighboring
destinations (“Vietnam Tourism Marketing Strategy”, n.d).
The first problem needs to be addressed is that Vietnam tourism’s selling proposition has
not illustrated clearly its image to differentiate itself from neighbor countries. The new logo
and slogan is not attractive enough to allure potential visitors. In details, the message for
tourism promotion has changed many times from Vietnam – a destination for a new
Millennium, Welcome to Vietnam, Vietnam – Hidden charm to Vietnam – Timeless charm
respectively for the past ten years. Such slogans are too vague and abstract to draw up a real
picture of Vietnam is minds of potential tourists. What is exactly the Vietnamese charm? In
comparison with Malaysia brand – Truly Asia or India brand – Incredible India, which can be
visualized as destinations of culture through their slogans, Vietnam brand slogan cannot
describe clearly its characteristics. Also, the video to promote for new slogan of Vietnam
tourism has not been appeared on official website of Vietnam Administration of Tourism.
There are many different versions of advertising clip for this campaign, but just received
4,458 views on Youtube and around under 2,000 views on other sites. These figures prove the
fact that this campaign to promote Vietnam tourism brand has not been successful up to now.
Marketing campaigns following to back up brand-building does not really match with the
real infrastructure. In other words, reality of Vietnam tourism does not live up to what were
advertised. To suppose that fact, many experts also state that most of tourists feel
disappointed when they come to Vietnam as it appear to be under their expectation (“Building
Proceedings of the Second Asia-Pacific Conference on Global Business, Economics, Finance and Social Sciences
(AP15Vietnam Conference) ISBN: 978-1-63415-833-6
Danang-Vietnam, 10-12 July, 2015 Paper ID: VL515
8 www.globalbizresearch.org
a strong brand”, 2014). Still, there is a distance between tourists’ expectations and
perceptions of Vietnam destination experiences. This problem is attributed to an ineffective
market approach and research as well as lacking of infrastructure investment. Consequently,
the power of words from those tourists vulnerably destroys the image of Vietnam in potential
tourists. In addition, a strong brand can attract tourists coming back. However, recent surveys
indicated that a portion of tourists stating not coming back to Vietnam was up to 80-85% with
various reasons such as negative social issues or environmental pollution as well. Meanwhile
another survey showed that tourists kept returning to Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore
(“Building a strong brand”, 2014).
In terms of building strong brand for Vietnam tourism, the strategy did not focus much on
regional cooperation with other countries in Asia, such as Malaysia, Thailand, Cambodia, etc
to develop regional tourism brand and as a result, Vietnam brand is also upgraded. Besides,
coordination between localities with co – advertising and developing branding is still
underestimated. For example, in the Coastal South Central area, despite of many
geographical features in common, each province has developed its own tourism resources
regardless of co - advertising and coordinating to create wonderful package tours for tourists.
Even when a neighbor province has a festival to promote local brand, tourists in nearby areas
still did not know about that owing to lack of co – advertising.
It cannot be denied that budget is essential for promoting brand. As a matter of fact,
budget for Vietnam tourism marketing is still limited. Although the government pushes
ahead this plan and states that it would be on top of agenda, there is not much funding for
those relevant activities. According to the VNAT, although a new logo and new slogan –
Vietnam Timeless Charm has been in use, there are not much for following campaigns (“VN
to develop”, 2013).
As of now, the tourism sector has not succeeded in representing Vietnam’s image in such
an unique and attractive way. This consequence is attributed to a lack of professionalism in
brand-building strategy. For example, Vietnam tourism still lacks marketing websites and
formal overseas representatives in target market to promote the image of this country
(“Vietnam Tourism Marketing Strategy”, n.d). Therefore, Vietnam’s image is not
successfully transmitted to potential tourists to raise their awareness of Vietnam as an
appealing destination. Most importantly, among destination image attributes, human
dimension – both tourism industry employees and local residents is regarded as the most
crucial factor in destination image-building (Kilter, Donald, Rein, 1993; Freire, 2009) (cited
by Bui & Perez, 2010). As a matter of fact, Vietnam is lacking of high workforce and
professionalism in this industry to operate and promote well for the country’s brand.
Proceedings of the Second Asia-Pacific Conference on Global Business, Economics, Finance and Social Sciences
(AP15Vietnam Conference) ISBN: 978-1-63415-833-6
Danang-Vietnam, 10-12 July, 2015 Paper ID: VL515
9 www.globalbizresearch.org
5. Assessment and Recommendation
In the severe competition nowadays, a strong tourism brand has power to stand out the
country and make it become a distinguishable destination from its competitors. Having a lot
of World heritages and marvelous culture and natural beauty like Vietnam does not mean that
country could be successful in brand positioning.
To reach the goal of international branding for tourism, the main and foremost task
should be enhance the collaboration between localities as some researches state that when
tourists set foot in a place, they would utilize the chance to discover the whole region instead
of single province (“VN to develop”, 2013). Therefore, every locality in the same area should
develop a collaborative strategy on regional branding in order to support and coordinate with
each others to develop tourism industry, rather than competing among that area which could
results in waste of money and resources.
In addition, Vietnam tourism brand should be made from bottom up, which means not
only focusing on advertising campaigns, the government should also invest in infrastructure
for this industry, such as accessibility, accommodation, etc to create a better environment for
tourism in addition to preserve and promote national heritages. A successful branding is
associated with not only in-deep own national culture value but also tourists’ perceived of that
destination. As a matter of fact, what tourists’ self – image about Vietnam is quite different
from what Vietnam image is trying to disclose. Thus, a tourism environment should be
focused to create a better experience for tourists and consequently, it can enhance the
country’s brand.
Besides, there were some suggestions that Vietnam should make advantages of its cuisine
and effectively explore tourism industry basing on this kind of brand as cuisine is regarded as
an integral element of a destination’s culture as a survey conducted by Wego - tourism
website showed that local food is one of the main reasons for 60% of travelers choosing a
destination. The slogan follow would be ‘Kitchen of the World’ (“Building a strong brand”,
2014). However, from the writer’s perspective, Vietnam tourism should seize the chance of
its wonderful cuisine but not make it centre of the selling proposition as it will blur other
special and unique cultural as well as natural heritages of this destination, which plays an
essential role in Vietnamese daily life and tourism industry as a whole.
In order to build a strong and highly competitive brand, the government should have
tourism representatives in different target markets, such as: Japan, China, Korea, etc to
publicly advertise Vietnam tourism. To be more specific, a network of representative offices
and tourist information centers in major hubs of key and potential markets should be
established in order to make it more familiar with foreigners and potentially increase the
amount of tourism visiting Vietnam (“Building a strong brand”, 2014). Marketing activities
Proceedings of the Second Asia-Pacific Conference on Global Business, Economics, Finance and Social Sciences
(AP15Vietnam Conference) ISBN: 978-1-63415-833-6
Danang-Vietnam, 10-12 July, 2015 Paper ID: VL515
10 www.globalbizresearch.org
should be timely and consistently to keep boasting the country’s image. Also, the distribution
channels of Vietnam’s image should be various with both modern and traditional channels.
For most people, tourism advertising on television is the most attractive in all means of
media. However, this channel was neglected in promoting Vietnam tourism branding, which
results an untapped market of elder tourists who rarely use internet to search for a destination.
Human factor also plays an important role in brand-building process of Vietnam. As it
involves customer satisfaction and the attitude of people delivering tourist services, tourism
organizations should motive and train their employees to raise the quality and gain customer
satisfaction, consequently contribute to strengthen Vietnam tourism brand. Besides, as Kilter,
Donald, Rein (1993) identify the important of local residents’ attitude rather than other brand
attributes in image-building (cited by Bui & Perez, 2010), the DMO of Vietnam should also
focus on training local people who work in the tourism industry to create a positive image of
Vietnam destination.
Another valuable idea needs to take into account is building brands for major tourism
enterprises. In other words, currently, the size of many companies working in tourism
industry in Vietnam is mostly small and medium with small brands (“VN to develop”, 2013);
therefore, the competitiveness of service providers in Vietnam should be raised like
Saigontourist or Vietravel in order to compete worldwide and bring Vietnam’s image out to
the world easily. Once these entrepreneurs have such incentives for government, they are
able to firmly establish and develop, which leads to the development of tourism sector as a
whole and work effectively together towards carving out an identity for the country’s brand.
6. Conclusion
Developing Vietnamese tourism brand is one of the foremost tasks to promote the
country’s image and generate the competitive advantage to compete with other destinations.
Although there are more and more visits to Vietnam, the country’s brand position in tourism
is still not high in Asia. In this paper, some issues in policy and practice have been addressed,
such as: Vietnam tourism brand cannot be distinguishable from competitors; customers’ self-
image about Vietnam is quite different from what DMO is trying to disclose; human
dimension lacks profession in operating tourist services and promoting brand, financial
budget is not sufficient, lack of collaboration between localities. Those barriers are holding
Vietnam tourism back as well as make its brand cannot be competitive among Asian countries
as well as worldwide. In this paper, there are some suggestions for Vietnam tourism branding
on the basic of what were mentioned in tourism development strategy of Vietnam destination
(2020, vision to 2030). The first and foremost task is enhancing the level of collaboration
between localities in the same region. Moreover, the quality of infrastructure should be
focused to create a better environment for tourists and therefore, create an attractive image of
Proceedings of the Second Asia-Pacific Conference on Global Business, Economics, Finance and Social Sciences
(AP15Vietnam Conference) ISBN: 978-1-63415-833-6
Danang-Vietnam, 10-12 July, 2015 Paper ID: VL515
11 www.globalbizresearch.org
Vietnam in their mind. Besides, tourism representatives in target markets should be
established for better promotion of Vietnam tourism brand. More importantly, human
dimension, in terms of local residents and workers in tourism industry should be trained to be
more professional as they are the ones who directly deal with tourists and supply the services.
Once Vietnam strengthens its tourism brand position, it will push the country’s economic and
social development.
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