Inaccurate slogan, uncreative officials

By Andrew Salmon

Yet again, Korea is being rebranded. We have the brilliant minds at the Ministry of Culture and Tourism to thank for ― fanfare, please ― the new national slogan "Creative Korea." This initiative raises several questions.

Firstly: Do we really need a rebrand, given that the old (though underused) international brand, "Dynamic Korea," still remains so relevant for most sectors of economy and society?

Secondly: Why did the culture ministry undertake this task? According to reports, this slogan is not just for tourism, it is to be the over-arching national brand. Did the ministry coordinate with the agencies that oversee sectors where international stakeholders' roles are critical ― eg the ministries responsible for exports and foreign investment promotion?

I doubt it.

After all, Korea, Inc., is many things but "creative" is not among them. The nation's economic engine is the manufacturing sector: tech components, autos, consumer electronics, ships, steel, petrochemicals. These industries have done very nicely, thank you, without being creative. Korean conglomerates are "fast followers" which have leveraged core competencies ― swift decision-making, disciplined HR, manufacturing synergies ― to achieve economies of scale and global reach.

Korean companies do not create new product categories: they are incremental innovators (a faster chipset, a thinner screen, a gadget with more functions). When Korean firms have got creative and tried to pioneer new categories ― such as 3D TVs and smart homes ― they have failed. Being "first mover" demands huge investment and entails major risk.

Even successful creativity is no guarantor of success. The one sector where Korea leads the world in technology is shipbuilding/marine engineering. That sector now teeters on the brink of massive restructuring, while less innovative sectors (such as autos and electronics) motor along happily.

Granted, all the above is big business. What about little business? While chaebol dominate the top of the economy, the bottom of the economy is populated by countless mom ‘n pop business. There's not much creativity there. Example? Last week, near my office, a new coffee shop opened ― joining over a dozen near-identical businesses within a 100-meter radius.

What about the "creative economy" of promising, agile and creative tech-centric firms that could become Korea's next-generation, mid-sized enterprises? Alas, it is (thus far) all talk, little action. Foreign venture capital is sniffing around Teheran-no, but I hear of few deals and there is, as yet, no Korean Apple, Google or Uber on the horizon.

In short: Industrially, Korea has flourished, becoming the world's 11th largest economy without being creative. And this is known to foreign consumers and foreign investors.

Does "Creative Korea" work for tourism promotion? Not really, for similar reasons. The biggest (albeit, unofficial) marketing campaign to lure tourists to Korea is hallyu. Hallyu's flagship products are pop music and soap operas. But neither is original or creative. On the contrary, both K-pop and K-drama are relentlessly formulaic. (Indeed, the sector's training and production processes are not hugely different from those used by industry.)

OK, then perhaps "Creative Korea" is not designed to communicate where Korea is, but where it wants to be. Could it be an aspirational brand?

If so, the government has its work cut out. Not only does it need to force banks to lend to ventures, establish incubation programs and create a new, low-cap stock market ― all of which have been done ― it needs, if it truly seeks to unleash creativity, to revamp education and break the chaebols' stranglehold on the economy.

Both are massive tasks. I don't think the Park administration has the time or the stomach for either.

This makes me ponder. Perhaps, deep in the ministry's command bunker, the decision on the slogan was made, not to inform international tourists, buyers and investors, but to please a very different audience. This administration has prattled endlessly about the "creative economy," but has garnered meager results. Did the ministry decide to appease the Blue House with their new slogan…? Maybe. Maybe not.

A final point. Everything above is rational reasoning/guesswork. Marketing communications pros tend not to deliver rational messages, they prefer to trigger emotion. And that is why I don't like "Creative Korea." It has no cadence, no wordplay, no punch. While Seoul's newish slogan, "I.Seoul. U," leaves much to be desired, it at least boasts a touch of whimsy and fun. Not so "Creative Korea," which is not just inaccurate, it is plain dull.

Again, I ponder. Koreans love prefixing English words with the letter "k" and if the bureaucrats had used a bit of imagination, they could have spelled their slogan "Kreative Korea." That might have raised smiles (and would have pre-nullified plagiarism allegations).

But for risk-averse bureaucrats, that would not do. It would have been at bit too ― well, creative.

Andrew Salmon is a Seoul-based reporter and author. Reach him at
andrewcsalmon@yahoo.co.uk.