The Gyeongsangbuk-do Culture and Tourism Organization announced on Sept. 19 that it will hold the 2022 Gyeongbuk Tourism Startup Contest to boost the Gyeongbuk tourism industry’s competitiveness.
It will also create a boom for local tourism startups together with the Gyeongsangbuk-do Provincial Government and the Gyeongju City Government.
In particular, this contest will be held as part of a project to rev up local tourism by supporting local tourism startups.
The Gyeongsangbuk-do Culture and Tourism Organization is accelerating the development of new tourism business models and actively fostering technology and tourism contents through the 2022 Gyeongbuk Tourism Startup Contest to boost the self-sufficiency of Gyeongsangbuk-do tourism and secure local killer contents.
The target of this event is would-be business founders who can directly make profit from tourism with innovative ideas and tourism startups with less than nine years of business.
It is comprised of four sectors - new tourism startups in the pipeline, early tourism startups, regional win-win tourism venture startups, and traditional tourism startups.
Selected tourism startup founders or companies will receive up to 10 million won in commercialization funding and preferential benefits for moving to the Gyeongbuk Tourism Enterprise Support Center in Gyeongju, Gyeongsangbuk-do.
Applications can be submitted via email to the Tourism Enterprise Support Center Preparation TF Team at the Gyeongsangbuk-do Culture and Tourism Organization from Sept. 26 to Oct. 7.
Promoting Gyeongangbuk-do Tourism in Malaysia
The Gyeongsangbuk-do Government and the Gyeongbuk Culture and Tourism Organization participated in the MATTA FAIR 2022, held at the Kuala Lumpur World Trade Center (WTC) in Malaysia, from Sept. 2 to 4. At the fair, they conducted promotional activities to attract Malaysian tourists.
MATTA FAIR 2022 is Malaysia’s largest international tourism fair. It started in 1991.
In 2019, it was one of the three major international tourism exhibitions in Southeast Asia with over 1,300 companies and 110,000 general visitors from 14 countries.
In collaboration with the Korea Tourism Organization, Gyeongsangbuk-do ran an independent PR desk within the Korea Tourism Promotion Pavilion.
Gyeongsangbuk-do officials held publicity events that reflect trends such as a trip to Gyeongsangbuk-do amid a Korean cultural fever driven by the immense popularity of Korean contents, UNESCO world heritages in Gyeongsangbuk-do and local festivals.
They received positive responses from visitors.
In addition, the events garnered attention by intensively promoting local attractions and seasonal tourism resources such as Pohang where popular Korean TV shows “Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha” and “When the Camellia Blooms” were shot and Mungyeong, the filing location of “Alchemy of Souls” and “Kingdom.”
Attracting Tourists from Chinese-Speaking Countries
Gyeongsangbuk-do and the Gyeongsangbuk-do Culture and Tourism Organization are employing a two-track (online/offline) marketing strategy using popular OTT services country and local PR offices in a situation where local marketing is difficult due to COVID-19 lockdowns and quarantine guidelines in Chinese-speaking countries which send a large number of tourists to Korea.
Gyeongsangbuk-do and the Gyeongsangbuk-do Culture and Tourism Organization selected popular local OTT services for online marketing and played Gyeongsangbuk-do tourism promotion videos from July 25 to Aug. 15.
They also introduced Gyeongsangbuk-do’s summer leisure activities such as paragliding in Mungyeong and East coast surfing in the August issue of TTN, a Taiwanese travel magazine to target Taiwanese tourists.
The coming October issue will carry stories about Korean film and TV show filming locations such as Pohang and Mungyeong, Gyeongbuk Province in anticipation of a full-fledged endemic.
In Hong Kong, they ran the Gyeongsangbuk-do Public Relations Center in cooperation with the Korean Cultural Center from Aug. 23 to Sept. 3.
The center exhibited Andong Hahoe masks, pictures of Queen Elizabeth II’s visit to Andong, Gyeongsangbuk-do and offered do-it-yourself programs, such as Andong Hahoe mask coloring and trying on Hanbok dresses of Korea and held SNS events.
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