The Galaxy 6 in Japan: History, brand image, and country of origin

As reported by The Chosun Ilbo yesterday, "Samsung has removed its corporate logo from its Galaxy S6 smartphones sold in Japan amid deep distrust of Korea and Korean technology in the island country. Instead, the sleek smartphones features only the Galaxy brand name, as do all accessories." (click on the accompanying graphic to see a full size version)  According to the article, Japanese consumers have long favored domestic technology over imports.  It notes that "When it unveiled the Galaxy S3 in Japan in 2012, Samsung ranked third after Fujitsu (21.4 percent market share) and Apple (18.4 percent) with 14.8 percent of the market. But anti-Korean sentiment stoked by a new far-right government meant the Galaxy S5 fared poorly, and Samsung's share of the Japanese market fell to 10.7 percent in 2013 and to 5.6 percent last year."  The article concludes by quoting an industry insider who said "Japanese are very loyal to their national brands and have become wary after seeing their once-mighty brands get beaten by foreign rivals on the global stage."  It would appear that the industry insider is close to the mark.  In recent decades, leading Japanese electronics manufacturers have seen their lead in the global market eclipsed by Korean firms.  Still, this move by Samsung to remove its corporate logo is a sharp reminder of the importance of brand image and country of origin in promoting a brand.  In a broader sense, it may also indicate the difficulty Japan has in dealing with its 20th century history, which included forcible colonization of Korea.

Super brands and Korea's national image

The U.K. based market research firm YouGov has published its list of most-admired global brands, based on a multicountry survey, and the results are shown in the graphic at the left.  These results prompt me to make several observations.
First, it is noteworthy that Samsung's ranking is based in part on massive advertising and marketing expenditures that far outpace other companies on the list.  As reported by Reuters Samsung Electronics in 2013 was expected to spend more than $14 billion on advertising and marketing, an amount that exceeded Iceland's GDP.
Second, as observed by YouGov BrandIndex CEO Ted Marzilli, “Technology and internet brands transcend national boundaries and provide products and services that impact people’s daily lives. Whether it is technologies made by Samsung, Apple and Sony, or the wealth of information and videos made instantly available by Google and YouTube, these companies shape modern life and connect people from around the world, making them some of the most powerful global super brands.”  In this regard it is worth noting that if YouTube, owned by Google, were combined with its parent company, Google would be the number one brand in the world.
Third, as I've noted before, many people in the U.S. and other major markets around the world do not identify Samsung as a "Korean" company.  Equally as important, Samsung's marketing communications do not emphasize its identity as a Korean company.
Those who consult this blog regularly will know that I am very interested in the relationship between corporate and brand image. (see numerous posts relating to this topic here)  Earlier this week the Chosun Ilbo reported that "North Korea is the first thing that comes to the mind of foreigners when they think about Korea." This was based on a 50-country survey by the Presidential Council on Nation Branding in cooperation with the Samsung Economic Research Institute. As I've discussed in earlier posts, this corresponds with patterns of global web search attention revealed by Google Trends.

What do North Korea and the Samsung Galaxy S4 have in common?

Google's Zeitgeist 2013 report is out, showing that Nelson Mandela was the top trending search globally.  Here in Korea, the report is getting press attention because both "Samsung Galaxy S4" and "North Korea" appeared among the top ten trending search items worldwide during the year.
What makes this so interesting?  One year ago this month, I did a post entitled "Visualizing Korea's National Image," which compared searches for "Korea" and "North Korea" with those for "Samsung" and "LG."  That post contains two embedded line graphs from Google Trends and is worth re-reading since it bears on the current situation.  The embedded graphs have automatically been updated by Google through late 2013.  (see other posts on national image here)
In light of South Korea's great concern with its national image, especially during the Lee Myung-bak administration which established the Presidential Council on Nation Branding, global search activity this year underscores two powerful realities.  One is that military actions or other provocations by North Korea will attract international interest and attention regardless of what the South Korean government may do.  The other is that South Korea's leading companies, led by Samsung, do not emphasize in their marketing communications that they are based in Korea.  In fact, there is considerable evidence that, all around the world, a significant proportion of consumers are unaware that Samsung is a South Korean company.  Last year, for example, consumers in China staged a demonstration at a Samsung outlet, thinking erroneously that it was a Japanese company.

Visualizing Korea's national image

As readers of this blog are well aware, I've long been interested in the matter of Korea's national image and the efforts of the Korean government to deal with it. To retrieve earlier posts on the topic, use the search box at the right and enter "national image" or look at just this post from 2009.
Today, in what will probably be my final post of 2012, I'd like to introduce a new perspective on Korea's national image, courtesy of Google Trends (formerly Google Insights for Search).  As noted in several earlier posts (e.g. this one) Google Trends is a valuable tool for studying world attention patterns in the information age.
As shown in the graphic below, a comparison of worldwide search activity for "North Korea" and "South Korea" vividly highlights (the peaks on the graph) attention to North Korea's attacks on the South, its nuclear tests and generally emphasizes the military confrontation between north and south.

To test this, use the hyperlink to view the full report in Google trends and hover over the news items indicated by capital letters on the peaks of the graph.
In earlier posts, a few years back, I published separate links that showed patterns in searches for "Samsung," "LG," and "Hyundai," but it is more interesting to include a couple of these companies in the same chart, as below.  I think the relative volume of search for Samsung and LG, versus North and South Korea, provides a powerful message about Korea's national image.  At least it provides food for thought and data-based evidence of relevance to policymakers. I encourage you to explore the data using Google Trends and its different capabilities. The animations that accompany the world map are particularly fun. I will revisit this topic, so your reactions and comments are welcome!

North Korean flag mistake at London Olympics and misperceptions of Korea

I must confess that I was only slightly surprised to learn that the North Korean women's soccer game against Colombia had been delayed because of the mistaken display of South Korea's flag on a big screen in the stadium which was used to introduce North Korea's players.  Reuters and other major media published a photo illustrating the problem (click on the photo to see a full-size version).  The reason I was only mildly surprised is that public misperceptions of Korea are rather widespread around the world, especially in the West.  I'm sure that survey data would show quite a large number of people  are unaware of the difference between North and South Korea, or even that Korea is divided.  Readers may be interested in my earlier posts on the topic of Korea's national image (e.g. here,)

Korean Social Networking Trends in the Smartphone Era

This is a follow-on to the previous post and earlier posts about social networking in Korea.  The Joongang Daily has an interesting article with data from Metrix showing what happened to social network service traffic in Korea during the year following arrival of the Apple iPhone and the so-called "smart phone shock" here.  As shown in the accompanying graphic (click on it to see a larger version), although Korea's homegrown Cyworld still has far more members than Facebook or Twitter, the latter two services have relatively more pageviews---many more per user!
There are several main reasons for the relative success of Facebook and Twitter in the face of a well-established Cyworld that was already dominant in the Korean market and had operated here for nearly half a decade before Facebook was even invented in the U.S.   First, Cyworld was designed as a Korean language service, with Korean users in mind.   It failed in its efforts to penetrate such international markets as the U.S., Germany, Taiwan and Japan.  Second, while Facebook and Twitter took advantage of the mobile broadband and smartphone revolution, Cyworld neglected Apple's iPhone and the new Android phones, instead concentrating on the outmoded Windows mobile platform.  Finally, the internet is inherently a global phenomenon.  Such SNS services as Facebook and Twitter allow networking throughout the world, across most national borders.  As the Joongang Daily article points out, Cyworld's image of being a Korean company rather than an international one was a big obstacle.

New Evidence of American Misperceptions of Korea

The Chicago Council on Global Affairs has recently published a Report on U.S. Attitudes Toward the Republic of Korea, authored by Victor D. Cha and Katrin Katz.   A PDF version of the study can be downloaded from the Council's Website.  Coincidentally, both authors are recent alumni of the Fulbright program in Korea!  Their study was part of a national survey by the Chicago Council and it contains some findings that should alarm those who are concerned with the health of the U.S.-Korea alliance.
The survey, conducted earlier this year, found general awareness of South Korea in the U.S. to be low.  For example, only 51 percent of respondents thought of South Korea as a democracy, compared with 40 percent who thought it was not a democracy.  This despite Korea's status as one of the most successful examples of peaceful democratic transition in modern international relations history!  Fifty percent of survey respondents thought that Buddhism had the most followers of any major religion in Korea, while only 19 percent mentioned Christianity.  Fully 71 percent of respondents did not know that South Korea is one of the United States top ten trading partners.
Findings such as these are of concern because of their impact on public support for key U.S. policies toward Korea, including the pending Free Trade Agreement, the North Korean Nuclear issue, and the presence of U.S. troops in South Korea, to name a few.  Readers of this blog will know that I am very interested in the nature of Korea's national image and the major factors shaping it, including the internet and new digital media.  The easiest way to see past posts, such as this one, is to enter "national image" in the search box to the right.
The thought that U.S. policy toward Korea might be influenced by vague and misguided public images is disturbing to me, as it should be to all who are concerned with the current and future health of the relationship between our two nations.

Korean Cultural Treasures Now Being Shown on YouTube

I was very happy to learn via a short article in the Chosun Ilbo, that Korea is beginning to share videos of its cultural treasures on a YouTube Channel.   This is one small example, but a very good one, of how South Korea can go about improving its national image.  I could imagine the Korean heritage channel on YouTube being supplemented by channels dealing with many other interesting topics about Korea.  Meanwhile, this cultural heritage YouTube channel is a very good start.

Image of Korea's Technology Level Trails Germany, Japan, U.S.

An interesting article in the Joongang Daily reports that the image of the technology level of Korean products trails that of Germany, the U.S. and Japan.  (click on the graphic at left to see a larger version) As readers will know from previous posts, I have a longstanding interest in the problem of national images--how they are formed, how they change and the influence they have upon foreign policy, to name just a few aspects of my interest.
Today's article is based on a 2009 report by the Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency.  It notes that if products of such advanced countries as the U.S., Japan and Germany are valued at $100 on average, South Korean products of the same quality are valued at $71.50.  The article notes that, although there has been an improvement in Korea's image over the past several years, the "Korea discount" is still there.  In other words, tension between South Korea and North Korea is still a major downside to consumer perceptions.  According to a KOTRA official, "In the survey, students and the general public outside the corporate realm linked South Korea more with the Korean War and North Korea's alleged nuclear weapons program than with technologies and economic development."  Finally, one in four people surveyed by KOTRA thought that Samsung was a Japanese brand.

Seoul Video Contest: "Streaming Seoul 2009"

This post is to call your attention to a very interesting and worthwhile video contest being sponsored by the City of Seoul called "Streaming Seoul 2009."   Click on the title or here to access their web site.  The contest is open to all, regardless of nationality, but there is a particular interest in how people from other countries and foreigners residing in Seoul experience and view the city.
Those of you who follow this blog know that I've long been concerned with questions surrounding national image and brand image, whether that be for a city, a corporation or another sort of organization.  Of course, this blog also concerns itself with developments in mobile communication.  One part of the big transformation taking place is the growing ease with which video can be recorded and shared with others via the internet.
I notice that the deadline for submissions to the contest is December 31.  That leaves just over three weeks for videophiles to shoot some video and put together a potential prize-winner.  The contest offers cash prizes for several categories of video.
My personal thanks to Danny Taewoo "Technokimchi" Kim for calling this contest to my attention.

Korea's Image Problem

A headline in the Joongang Daily caught my attention: "Korea Aiming to Refine Image Abroad." The article which followed the headline dealt with efforts of the Lee Myung Bak administration to improve the nation's brand image in the world. President Lee has convened a Presidential Council on National Branding. Lee Chan-buom, now the Director General of Korea's Presidential Council on National Branding, noted the adverse impact on Korea's image of news media coverage of the anti-US beef import candlelight vigils in early 2008. Those demonstrations were visually colorful, prolonged and mysterious to most western and international television viewers and internet users. Rightly or wrongly so, they created an image that South Korea is unstable, flighty and tends toward anti-Americanism. The article notes that nation-branding may be a difficult task in a country that has seen numerous street protests, corruption and frequent confrontation with its neighbor, North Korea. I'll say!
I've long been interested in the effects of mainstream media coverage, especially television, on public opinion and U.S. foreign policy toward other countries. (see, for example, my article on "Quiet Diplomacy in a Television Era Use the link and you can read the full text, PDF.). That was back in 1990. However, despite the explosive growth of the internet, (see my monograph, The Internet and Foreign Policy) the pattern continues. Korea's new President Council on National Branding will have to deal with television and the internet, most especially since convergence means that television (IPTV) is now part of the internet. In this new media environment, coverage by CNN, BBC World or The New York Times are a fact of life. Anti-beef import protests, stories about the sexual adventures of North Korea's Kim Jong-Il, and almost any topic, will be fair game for the world's media. The internet, television and the media (roughly in that order) are today significant determinants of corporate, national and even individual images. In this context, how should Korea proceed to improve its national image?
I have a couple of thoughts. First, news coverage of North Korea, and news coverage of demonstrations in South Korea are not going to go away. Furthermore, they are not under the control of the South Korean government. The only real solution to the problem that North Korea poses for South Korea's national image is to make real progress toward reunification, and the sooner the better. Second, any efforts to brand Korea should stay away from quick-fix advertising gimmicks like "Korea Sparkling" or even "Dynamic Korea" and should build from long-standing realities. For example, Hangul is the Korean alphabet and that is not likely to change. Kimchi is eaten by Koreans and that, too, is unlikely to change anytime soon. It is an interesting challenge. I don't have any further insights at the moment, but will likely comment in future posts.

FTSE to Promote Korea to 'Developed Market'

It's official.  As reported in the Chosun Ilbo online English edition, the Korean stock market is to be promoted to "developed" from "advanced emerging" status by the Financial Times Stock Exchange index.  The FTSE is used by many European investors, and the promotion would help the country draw more foreign investment and raise stock and bond prices, which have been notoriously undervalued. Korea thus joins 24 "developed" markets.  My reaction in part:  better late than never.  Another part of my reaction:  national image, or the brand image and brand value of a nation are extremely important in this information era.  This cannot help but enhance South Korea's national image.

World Attention in the Information Age: Korea's National Image

In 1941 Harold Laswell, one of the social scientists whose work led to the creation of communication research as a field of study, wrote a thought-provoking article titled "World Attention Survey." Laswell's research tried to map attention patterns around the world by analyzing the content of newspapers, in particular the countries and issues mentioned in newspaper articles. My first book, Television's Window on the World, was based on my doctoral dissertation and attempted to do something similar with U.S. network television in the 1970s. Today, thanks to the internet and some new Google services, it is possible to do a "World Attention Survey," with much less manual effort than when Laswell was conducting his research or when I laboriously, with the help of research assistants, hand-coded television content for analysis in my dissertation. To illustrate the possibilities, I will show in this post how Google Insight, its brand-new service, can be used to shed empirical light on the question of Korea's national or brand image. In an earlier post, I showed how searches of Google News could be used to help analyze Korea's national image. Google Insight provides an important new piece of the puzzle about national image because it shows patterns of search activity on the internet by people around the world. If you doubt this, take a look at the results of the following global, unfiltered set of searches on Google Insights for Search. Just click on the links to see the results of worldwide search activity, from 2004 to the present, for each of the following terms.

• Korea
• Samsung
• LG
• Hyundai

If you took time to look at each of the results pages by clicking on each of the four links above and scrolling through the results page, you'll agree with me that several definite patterns show up.

• First, searches for Korea tend to turn up news of North Korea's nuclear test and related political problems. Not surprisingly, the topics covered by the 4,000 plus media sources in Google News and the search patterns shown by Insights for Search, tend to be highly correlated. Mainstream media coverage and global search patterns are both part of "World Attention" in this information era.
• Second, searches for Samsung and LG tend to center around information and communication technologies, notably television sets and mobile phones.
• Third, searches for Hyundai make it clear that Hyundai is viewed around the world as an automobile manufacturer, first and foremost.
• Fourth, the results for regional distribution of search behavior around the world show clearly that Korea's corporations have effectively established a presence in developing countries as well as those of the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.

These preliminary observations are based on a simple, unfiltered search for several terms. Obviously, much more could be learned by comparing search patterns across different countries or regions. However, I do think the results are intriguing. I assume that a majority of Google searchers around the world may NOT be aware that Samsung, Hyundai and LG are Korean companies, so that complicates the question of their contribution to Korea's national image. It also seems that the major mainstream media and their consistent focus on political problems or crises--currently North Korea's nuclear progam and the six-party talks--form a part of South Korea's image. This part of the image, however negative it may be, will be hard to escape short of reconciliation and eventually reunification on the Korean peninsula.

Korea's National Image

The current flood of images of anti-American beef protests, candlelight vigils and meat-processing plants in the U.S. has implications for South Korea's national image. However, these new images will become part of a larger context which, cumulatively, shapes Korea's national image. A few archive searches on Google News, can give us a very rough idea of the predominant images that Korea is projecting these days, wittingly or unwittingly. Google News is a computer-generated news site that aggregates headlines from more than 4,500 English-language news sources worldwide. As such, it is one of the more comprehensive sources of world news media attention patterns currently available. This is not to suggest that it is a comprehensive measure, especially since Google news crawls only English sources.

To start with, I did a Google archive search for "Korea broadband revolution" (without the quotes) It produces results like the first graphic included here (click on the graphics to enlarge). A search for "Korea broadband" produces very similar results. For the first seven and a half years of the 21st century, news media around the world paid attention to South Korea as the world leader in broadband networks.

Another image of Korea conveyed by media around the world has to do with North Korea's nuclear development. As shown in the second graphic here, world media attention to this story line started during the Clinton Administration's negotiations with North Korea in the 1990s. High levels of attention then resumed during the Bush administration, both before and after North Korea's 2006 nuclear test.

The summer Olympic Games are traditionally the world's largest planned television and media event, and that was particularly the case for the 1988 Seoul Olympics. South Korea seized on the opportunity of hosting the Games to open up political communication with China, the Soviet Union and many socialist countries of Eastern Europe. The spike in international media attention to Korea surrounding the Seoul Olympics is vividly shown on the time line produced by a Google News archive search.

The division of Korea is today the world's last vestige of the World War II and Cold War era. For more than half a century, the demilitarized zone (DMZ) separating North and South Korea has been a prominent part of Korea's national image. The truce village an Panmunjom has long been a popular tourist destination and a mandatory backdrop for television coverage whenever a U.S. president or other high-level official visited Korea. In an important sense, the 1988 Seoul Olympics were a "coming-out party" for South Korea, with considerable emphasis on its electronics industry. We can safely say that, prior to the Seoul Olympics, South Korean electronics companies like Samsung Electronics, LG Electronics or Hynix, were relatively unknown around the world. Today that has changed, as shown by a recent poll of opinion leaders by The Corea Image Communication Institute, a Seoul-based organization that aims to promote positive images of Korea overseas. The Institute surveyed 139 foreign ``opinion leaders'' including diplomats, journalists, academics and businesspeople who have visited Korea or are currently staying in the country. When asked about Korea's best-known image, nearly half of all respondents picked indigenous corporate brands such as Samsung and LG, and Korea's Information Technology business. Another well-known image associated with Korea was the North Korea issue. More than 26 percent of those polled said Korea was ``best known" for the continuing nuclear standoff between the South and North. (see Korea Times article on the poll) Once again, a Google news archive search on "Samsung Electronics" suports the notion that it has contributed substantially to South Korea's national image over the past two decades.

Where's the Beef? The Sources of Public Anger

One reason that the 1980s Wendy's commercial keeps popping into my mind is that I, like most observers of the political upheaval in South Korea these days, wonder what are the true or genuine sources of public anger. Few people who observe the repeated candlelight vigils and the evolution of the anti-Lee Myung Bak government movement would question that the people seem angry. Koreans are passionate about many things, including their politics. But what are the sources of this current passion? According to press reports, they include:

• Opposition to President Lee's proposal for a Grand National Canal.
• Disagreement with the new President's media reforms, including changes in relevant cabinet ministries and creation of a new Broadcasting and Communications Commission.
• Opposition to education-sector reforms instituted by the new government.
• A general opposition to the way in which President Lee's government implemented its policies, without considering the wishes of the Korean people.

The list could probably go on, but it appears the primary source of public anger in South Korea was pinpointed in an insightful New York Times article by Choe Sang-Hun. That is, it has to do with nationalism and with Korean pride. Powerful television images from Camp David instantly conveyed to some Koreans that President Lee had kowtowed to President Bush by bringing him an agreement to resume imports of American beef in exchange hopefully for approval of the KORUS FTA. As correspondent Choe notes, when faced with the wall built from shipping containers, "... people pasted identical leaflets on it, their message dramatically summarizing Mr. Lee’s image and alienation from many of his people: “This is a new border for our country. From here starts the U.S. state of South Korea.”

Korea in Cyberspace: National and Brand Images

The current political uproar in South Korea and the flood of images it has released are important politically, economically and culturally. The images emanating from South Korea these days help to create the image of this nation in North America, Europe an other parts of the world, as well as here on the peninsula. Use of the term "flood" to describe the flow of images is appropriate insofar as the internet and modern digital communications accelerate the diffusion of political information. Here in South Korea, former President Kim Dae Jung and others have observed that the country is experimenting with "Direct Democracy." Without doing a quantitative empirical study, I would hazard a guess that the current political activity in South Korea, centered as it is around the internet and new digital media, is having an effect on Korea's national image in the world. According to an article in the Korea Herald, South Korea's embassy in Washington D.C. surveyed 136 U.S.-based experts on July 12-13. The survey found that 60.2 percent of the respondents believed the anti-U.S. beef rallies and candlelight vigils would damage Korea's image among Americans, while 27.2 percent said that they would not.

Candlelight vigils in the Spring are an ideal place to exploit the new media. Think how easy it is to snap photographs or record videos with your cellphone, and then share these with netizens. By definition, sharing such images with netizens means that they are available to anyone in the world. In other words, they help to define Korea's national image and its place in cyberspace. The point of this post is simply to note that South Korea is building its national image, or its place in cyberspace. Once constructed, national images cannot easily be altered or torn down, for the simple reason that the digital images stay there in cyberspace. Some elements of the emerging image also seem clear: candlelight vigils, labor demonstrations and anti-government protests, anti-Americanism, genuine fear of American beef, gullibility to rumors about Mad Cow Disease, and so forth. These elements are mixing with South Korea's existing national image which includes such aspects as being an "IT Powerhouse," "Broadband Leader," and a country which places a high priority on education, science and technology generally.