Leveraging the Tourism Sector in Bangladesh by Country Branding: An Exploratory Synopsis

Tourism is now recognized as the single largest service industry all over the world. Many countries want to achieve excellence on the industry. For obtaining success in tourism industry new concepts like country branding, or destination branding, or nation branding are come out. In this paper it is tried to bring in country branding concept for leveraging Bangladesh tourism sector. Country branding not only works for tourism but also works for trade & commerce and even creating relationship with other countries. But the most affirmative benefits are gained in the tourism sector by country branding. Through Bangladesh branding, tourism will find a position it deserves. Country branding is long term and continuous process like ‘product’ or ‘corporate’ branding. By considering the background characteristics of Bangladesh, this paper suggests to target the business tourist segment to attract to Bangladesh. Creating exclusive tourist zone for MICE tourism Bangladesh can earn a huge amount of foreign currency. Developing a favorable image, using comprehensive marketing plan, attracting foreign investment, hiring country branding experts, fostering regional alliances, and so on can leverage the country brand of Bangladesh. The present resources can be positioned in the world of tourist-market to make the country-brand stronger. Branding will be more effective if Bangladesh can develop its infrastructure and superstructure up to the world standard.)