Hi guys!
I’m Dury Jun in a third year who just started studying Marketing!
Until July, I honestly couldn’t make up my mind on what to specialize in amongst many different options. However, the idea that people in Marketing industries read customers’ thoughts and minds and sometimes even manipulate their willingness to purchase their products really fascinated me.
Products itself don’t scream. It’s Marketing people who actually make goods and services attractive and worth buying. No matter how fantastic or awesome products are, success on appealing to potential customers does really depend on Marketing strategies. You would not be able to make a penny even with your proud quality products if there’s no brilliant and outstanding advertisement supportive.
I’ve thought about this since I first came to Canada two years ago.
Being a person who grew up in Korea, I always crave Asian food, especially any Korean food not to mention. However, what I usually see is Japanese restaurants. Yes, I have to admit that Western find Sushi or Sashimi yummy, healthy, and not greasy at all. When localizing and adapting food is a key strategy on whether to survive foreign food markets, Japanese food obviously achieved a great success.
Then, in this very moment, I want to ask you a quick question.
Have you heard of “Bibimbap”?
I highly doubt it.
Bibimbap is a Korean dish mixed of cooked rice with various vegetables, beef (optional), garnishes and fried red pepper paste. It’s considered one very good dish among Vegan and healthy food freak. Plus, people can put in or take out any ingredients according to their preferences. Unfortunately, not many people in North America even don’t seem to know whether Bibimbap exists. As a number of people in North America are getting more and more health conscious these days, I surely thought Bibimbap has enormous potential to grow big. I just wished more people would get to know this yummy and healthy food. But you know what??
One day, I happened to find Bibimbap commercial on Youtube!!
Here’s a clip.
The very first word I spit when I found this was this;
Hurray!! X)
See how vegetables are presented by “colors” of people’s clothing? For example, Bibimbap’s one ingredient, carrots are represented by people wearing orange clothes. People in Korean traditional clothes are performing traditional dances and martial arts. This clip greatly introduce Korean food and traditions at the same time. The way people who created this ad melted them together is neither complicated nor too much to foreigners by simplifying both with “Color”.
Massive information at once never works.
Simplifying always wins.
Yes, as you see, there existed a commercial video for Bibimbap and this was even advertised at Time Square in NYC!! Since it’s on Time Square screen, the number of people trying out this new dish has increased progressively in NYC.
I again realized the power of advertisement ever since and found how fascinating it would to be a part of successful ad crews.
BUT
I have NO experience with marketing yet. On top of that, I really don’t know which area of marketing interests me. I only know that I’ll be more capable in dealing with Asian targeted products as I have Asian background. Specifically, I’m well aware of Northeast Asian culture. In addition, I found art history pretty interesting. If I decided to study art history further, I might be able to relate my marketing knowledge to this art industry related job. Nothing has decided and I’m still in search of my interests.
Hope I’m able to find my interests by this semester.
Wish me luck! 🙂