Www.onlinetravelvietnam.com: “Vietnam is like a beautiful girl, who is full of mystery and doesn’t want anybody to know about her,” says Dr. Julio Aramberri, chief of the Linguistics and Culture Faculty of HCM City’s Hoa Sen private university.

As Vietnam’s National Administration of Tourism (VNAT) launched a new tourism marketing campaign with the slogan “Vietnam – Your Destination,” Tuoi Tre Weekend magazine talked with Professor Aramberri about how Spain became a favourite holiday destination in Europe.

Whenever we hear the word ‘Spain,’ we immediately imagine colorful skirts, music and the flamenco, nice beaches, sunlight and the optimistic spirit of the Spanish people. And yet, we’ve never been to your country. How does ‘Spain’ put such images into our minds?

(Smiling) The image of a country is a very complicated issue. It not only depends on what we want to show to others but also on the way others want to see us.

History is important. Every country, especially long established states like Spain and Vietnam, have had many wonderful and also bad events.  Sometimes outsiders only remember the negative side. This is difficult to change. It is impossible to change such perceptions simply by the efforts of the people who are in charge of tourism advertising.

My country suffered a civil war in the 1930’s. Over 500,000 people died. When my country promoted tourism in the 1960’s and we focused on the European market, we had to overcome those memories.

What was your strategy?

After making surveys in our two major markets, Britain and Germany, we realized that people weren’t going to Spain for the things that we wanted to advertise. We thought that foreign visitors came to our country because we had a glorious history, cultural heritage, ancient churchs and streets, but we were wrong. They didn’t care about these things because many countries, including their own, have these things.

In 1970, we had around 13 million foreign tourists. The people who were in charge of tourism marketing like me and my co-workers began changing the image of Spain after we learned that most visitors go to Spain for the sun, its beautiful beaches and silky sand. The weather in Britain and Germany is gloomy all winter and the people often ask where they can find the sun. So our tourism slogan was “Everything Under the Sun” to draw them to us.

So you didn’t advertise so much what you have but rather the things that visitors want and need?

Yes, that’s true. We decided to not invest a lot of money to develop brand-new images about Spanish tourism when we were not sure of the result. We relied on what tourists wanted. “The sun, the sea and sand” are the things that attracted visitors from our two major markets. After that, we developed other products, such as cheap tours for families, culinary culture, night life, and so on. Spain has become a good and safe place, with reasonably priced services for families.

Foreign visitors don’t decide to visit your country for your heritage and culture, which are your pride. How does that make you feel?

Actually, we can’t sell the things that we think are the most valuable. That is quite painful but it is a fact. Everyone thinks that the culture and tradition of their own country are its greatest asset. However, we have to understand our image in the eyes of others. This is difficult because others don’t look at us the way we see ourselves.

We can’t tell our clients “You are really stupid! Why don’t you buy this, buy that? just because we think it is better.” The sun that belongs to the whole world became the sun of Spain in our tourism advertising campaign and the foundation for our follow-up.  When foreign visitors go to our country,then we introduce our music, museums, theatres, churches and cuisines to them.

We had great success advertising our images at that time and at present. We currently have around 60 million foreign visitors a year while our population is only 47 million.

As a tourism advisor and a lecturer in Vietnam, what are the issues for Vietnam’s tourism in your view?

I’ve worked with officials who are responsible for tourism marketing in many provinces and cities in Vietnam. Each location in Vietnam wants to be a tourist destination. That’s impossible, especially for foreign visitors.

In my first days in Vietnam, I took a ten-day trip from Hanoi to Ha Long, Hue, Da Nang and HCM City.  The foreign visitors have limited time – they want to visit beautiful locations like Nhatrang. How can you hope that international tourists will come to your city, which you think is really great so you you organize big festivals – but just a few tourists come. . . .

Every place in Vietnam is spending a lot of money on tourism promotion. They print many prettybrochures, which are a waste of money because they don’t know where to deliver them.  All these brochures praise the beauty of this place or that place but they lack information about activities and services for tourists.

Isn’t it natural for a province to think it is outstanding?

True, but we have to know about our major markets and what tourists are interested in. Though many people want to visit Sapa, but most western tourists miss Sapa and see only places like Hanoi, Hue, Hoi An, HCM City and the Mekong Delta. I think that Vietnam ought to offer only three major tourism products and focus its advertising activities on them.

An effective tourism slogan is also our concern. We recently finalized the “Impressive Vietnam” campaign in late January 2010.  What do you think of our slogans?

Perhaps your slogans are overly influenced by the tourism slogans of Thailand, Singapore and India (‘Amazing Thailand,’ ‘Uniquely Singapore,’ ‘Incredible India’). I think that Malaysia’s slogan is the most successful: ‘Malaysia – Truly Asia.’ Previously you had the slogan “Vietnam – A destination for the new millennium” which I thought was nonsense.

What symbols impress you the most?

Vietnam’s nón lá, áo dài and phở are absolutely iconic. Talking about Vietnam is talking about these things. Seeing these things, that’s Vietnam -- even though foreign tourists may not always see them on the street, just as you don’t always see people playing flamenco music or wearing colorful skirts in Spain.

You have to decide what are the salient characteristics of your country, just a few things. You have to choose and prioritize.

In theory, there are three things: knowing your market, advertising the products that visitors want to buy, and using easy-to-remember symbols.

What are the keys to development of our tourism industry?

Training, human resources training. Visitors not only remember what they see, but they treasure the experience of meeting ‘the people.’ Everyone they meet is an ambassador of Vietnam. It is high quality service, service that meets the expectations of your foreign guests, that will make Vietnam a first-class tourist destination.