THE JEJU Tourism Organisation (JTO) is eyeing the youth traveller segment in its goal to grow international arrivals, with plans to hold a lengthy K-Pop music and dance festival on the resort island in 2012.
Speaking to TTG Asia e-Daily, JTO president, Yang Young-Kuen, said the festival would run for at least 15 days up to a month, and feature several South Korean performers. While the key target market would be young people in Europe, the event would also be promoted among Asian youth.
Yang said: “Korean pop culture has a strong following in Europe and Asia, hence we decided to create this festival. We also intend to market cultural tours around Jeju to allow the youth to see and learn about the destination and its people while they are here.”
Yang explained that it was more beneficial to target young travellers, as the market offered “far more opportunities for repeat visits than the silver market (senior citizens)” and they are opinion leaders who would “lead others to visit a destination they like”.
The festival is one of the items on JTO’s action plan to reach out to youth travellers. It also includes harnessing online platforms like YouTube for destination marketing.
