A nation’s image is built while interacting with the international community from all aspects including politics, economy, military, culture, science and technology, and education based on the international community’s understanding, perception an...
A nation’s image is built while interacting with the international community from all aspects including politics, economy, military, culture, science and technology, and education based on the international community’s understanding, perception and evaluation of the applicable nation. In the face of the era of unlimited competition among nations, a nation’s image plays a crucial role in encouraging consumers to purchase goods from that nation. That is, good image translates to nation’s competitive advantage.
Today, China became one of the top four economy powerhouses in the world based on rapid growth during the last 30 years. When examined from the total production volume viewpoint, China is the powerhouse of manufacturing in the world. Production increase in China reached No. 4 position in the world, taking competitive advantage in the global market for the key industrial products such as steel, cement, chemical fertilizer, chemical fiber, woven goods, electronics and IT products. And China is ranked No. 3 in the world in terms of the amount exported to the overseas. According to the data announced by the World Bank, China economy growth’s contribution to the growth of the world GDP from 1980 to 2000 is 14%, which is No. 2 after the US (20.7%), while China’s contribution to the growth of global trade is ranked No. 2 in the world today. China’s GDP in 2008 is ranked No. 3 in the world while the amount of foreign currency reserved is 1.95 Trillion USD, which is No. 1 in the world. However, the Future Brand, a global brand strategy consulting company headquartered in New York announced the ‘national brand index’ in 2008, which shows that China’s national brand among the 78 nations is ranked 56th, which is low national competitiveness.
When overseas experience is examined, the nations that successfully publicized their nations’ brand share common denominators. That is, they started from the realities faced by their nations, and developed clear goal for the development of nation’s image. Moreover, the focus is on developing clear image that is in line with their characteristics. UK consolidated the image of a gentleman, while France is known for elegance, Germany is known for seriousness while US is known for freedom. Meanwhile, China is difficult to describe using only simple language because of the diverse elements such as its long-held history, numerous different ethnic groups, and vast land. This in turn negatively affects in creating one image for the nation since this conveys rather subtle image to the outside world. Accordingly, China needs to start from the reality faced by it, and organize the strategic position in a clear manner, and to develop unique brand to push for the long-term branding strategy.
Encouraged by the 2008 Beijing Olympics, China saw the possibility of developing its national brand. As the 2010 Shanghai EXPO approaches, China is faced yet another good opportunity to market China. Joshua Cooper Ramo, an advocate of the ‘Beijing Consensus’ claims in his new book, <Brand China> that the question of nation’s image is the most sensitive strategy question in China today. This demonstrates how urgent and serious is the mission faced by China to create its brand.
Strategy to enhance nation’s image should be considered national initiative in which government and companies need to implement long-term national vision based on structured and macro level research. However, the publicity activities conducted by China to this day were merely ad hoc, event oriented effort such as trade EXPO, art competition etc. This is the reality in China. Accordingly, this research analyzes domestic and overseas cases based on the understanding of nations’ policies pertaining to nations’ image, identifies China’s national image, and its problems, and sets up macro level vision, to search the direction for developing China’s national brand improvement.