Recently, the numbers of fans of Korean wave, which is also called Hallyu, is increasing in Myanmar. The impact is significant so that Korean goods like cosmetics, foods, merchandise of Korean music band groups are slowly entering the mainstream cultu...
Recently, the numbers of fans of Korean wave, which is also called Hallyu, is increasing in Myanmar. The impact is significant so that Korean goods like cosmetics, foods, merchandise of Korean music band groups are slowly entering the mainstream culture. Hallyu fans in Myanmar use other social networking sites like Twitter and Instagram to get more information about Korean culture. The research shows that an exposure to foreign culture may positively influence potential visitor’s attitudes and consequently the intention to travel to the country. Because K-Pop and Hallyu in general introduces and promotes Korean’s cultures, cuisines, fashion, landscape and lifestyle effectively, this may be a viable segment to target. If Myanmar Hallyu fans are more likely to visit Korea, the knowledge of their demographic characteristics and motivations other than Hallyu are important for researchers and marketers. This research aimed to identify those markets that are motivated by Hallyu and describe their socio-economic, motivational and other characteristics. The results show that Hallyu-motivated Myanmar people have different characteristics from non-Hallyu motivated respondents. The Hallyu-motivated Myanmarese are generally younger, have more knowledge about Korea, they show more interest in meeting Koreans, they are motivated by fashion, food, cosmetics, and visiting friends and relatives in Korea. They also display higher motivation for non-hallyu factors, which makes this potential segment difficult to use in direct marketing campaign due to the lack of a clear few non-Hallyu characteristics that motivate them to travel.