The Creative Aspect of Country Branding

Kinga Jentetics

• Publisher: Kinga Jentetics
• Year: 2013
• eBook ISBN: 9786155248092
• Topic: Negocios y empresa
• Subtopic: Marketing
• Index: Marketing

"Music is a fundamental channel of communication: through music people can share emotions, intentions and thoughts even though their spoken languages may be mutually incomprehensible." (Hargreaves – Miell – McDonald, 2002) It can be a supporting baseline, which helps people and skilled composers to find their way to express their deep and profound emotional life and imagination.

In fact, music is present in our lives everywhere playing a greater part than ever before. The rapid technological development made it possible to listen to music every time and everywhere through the commercialization and economic power of music.

But how is music connected to country branding and nation image? The answer is quite simple: music can be a source of a wide range of associations. When we listen to a song featuring a country's original characteristics, the nation itself pops into our mind with all of its typical symbols, inhabitants – briefly the image of a country.

The key question in my paper is how music is able to influence the country image. The main objective of this paper is to uncover the linkage between music and country image and to draw a model based on Anholt-hexagon (2003) that can be used by practitioners as well. The paper's novelty lies in the synthesis of theoretical approaches, which were not applied and connected to each other before according to secondary research. Nevertheless, the topic's nature requires several examples from practical life as well: international and Hungarian case studies, moreover primary research were applied.

1. Introduction

Musical rhythm is in our first heartbeat and it follows us in every moment in forms of communication, entertainment and learning. “Music is a fundamental channel of communication: through music people can share emotions, intentions and thoughts even though their spoken languages may be mutually incomprehensible.” (Hargreaves – Miell – McDonald, 2002) It can be a supporting baseline, which helps people and skilled composers to find their way to express their deep and profound emotional life and imagination.

In fact, music is present in our lives everywhere playing a greater part than ever before. The rapid technological development made it possible to listen to music every time and everywhere through the commercialization and economic power of music. Different appliances have been invented in a more and more inexpensive way to enjoy the rhythms of music: vinyl, walkman, CD, Internet, MIDI interface, video recorders and nowadays iPod and mp3 players expanded the ways in which people experience music – a musical person can act as a consumer, fan, listener, composer, arranger, performer or critic – all diverse roles have been opened to us nowadays to express our identities and being a member of our wished reference group.

But how is music connected to country branding and nation image? The answer is quite simple: music can be a source of a wide range of associations. When we listen to a song featuring a country’s original characteristics, the nation itself pops into our mind with all of its typical symbols, inhabitants – briefly the image of a country. When flamenco is played we cannot avoid imagining the passionate dancing movements, temperamental women and men, moreover the associations of bullfights. When one plays the bagpipe we are picturing gentlemen in Scottish skirt, as long as accordion reminds us of the background music during French movies, so Paris and specific French cuisine.

As a presumption of my paper music affects the reputation of countries as playing a crucial role in the cluster of creative class (Florida, 2002). „The creative class is a fast-growing, highly educated, and well-paid segment of the workforce on whose efforts corporate profits and economic growth increasingly depend” (Florida, 2002 p. 64.). Members of the creative class are involved in a wide variety of work in different industries – from technology to entertainment, journalism to finance, high-end manufacturing to the arts. In the economic crisis innovative ideas and especially creative ideas are needed to engage in reforms in my opinion, the presence of creative class has to be scrutinized in the matter of country branding as well. Zenker (2011) highlights the importance of creative class in country branding marking it as a relevant target group from the resident point of view.

But music is just one element of a nation’s culture, which plays a crucial role in a country’s image. Indeed, the examination of culture can give the mutual cross-section of music and country image. Besides music there are several defining elements of culture like religion and believes, language, clothes, theatre, cinema and so on. However, culture and especially music plays a crucial role in countries’ lives, because it frames the basic awareness of national identity, nationalism and patriotism.

The key question in my paper is how music is able to influence the country image. In the following, this question is divided into sub questions identifying narrower subfields of the topic. The main objective of my paper is to uncover the linkage between music and country image and to draw a model based on Anholt-hexagon (2003) that can be used by practitioners as well. Therefore I will review the relevant literature in this field focusing on the creative class (Florida, 2002) and their connection to each other. The paper’s novelty lies in the synthesis of theoretical approaches, which were not applied and connected to each other before according to my secondary research. Nevertheless, the topic’s nature requires several examples from practical life as well: I analysed different international and Hungarian case studies where it was applicable. For distinguishing the practical examples I enhanced them with separate boxes in order to support the relevance of theoretic approach.

Because of the novelty of the topic it was necessary to collect primary data besides secondary ones. Therefore, I conducted in-depth interviews with experts from the music industry, focus group interviews with visitors and I designed a questionnaire in order to gain quantifiable data from visitors especially in case of Hungary. During the primary research I applied different creative techniques (combining audio, visual and audiovisual elements) in order to identify the main associations of respondents. In the primary research part the Hungarian focus from a practical point of view is enhanced, especially because there is no direct literature available on this topic. As a result, I will demonstrate the Hungarian Musical Country Image in Chapter 5 followed by some suggestions in Chapter 7 how to improve country image strategy built on music.

2. Research statement and methodology

During my essay I will answer the following questions:

Q1: What is the cultural aspect of country branding in today’s’ economy?

Q2: How can the creative class build competitive advantages for country branding?

Q3: What are the main platforms of musical nation image?

Q4: How can music influence the nation image in terms of Anholt-hexagon?

Q5: Does Hungary have a musical nation image?

Q6: How can Hungary improve its musical nation image?

For answering these research questions I used the following presumptions:

1: Cultural value is more and more important in today’s economy.

2: The creative class contributes to the competitive advantages of a country in several ways.

3: One of the most important musical platforms is the digital one due to the digital shift in the music industry.

4: Musical nation image can be drawn based on the concept of Anholt-hexagon.

5: Hungary unfortunately does not have a steady and strong musical nation image.

During the research two main perspectives are applied: exploratory and descriptive research. Exploratory research helped me to define the problem, determine the best research design, data collection method and selection of subjects by applying secondary research such as reviewing available literature and data, besides qualitative approaches such as in-depth interviews, focus groups, projective methods, case studies. During the descriptive research I collected quantifiable data for further generalizations for the given population.

In the research method I differentiated three phases depicted on Figure 1. First of all, by secondary research I analyzed and synthesized the literature background of country branding and culture, the phenomenon of creative class and its possible relation to each other. In the primary research I focused on questions could not be answered directly after my secondary research. During qualitative research phase I conducted in-depth interviews with practitioners and focus group interviews with visitors. As part of the quantitative method I designed a survey to get some quantifiable insights from visitors in the field of country and music, especially in case of Hungary. The detailed methodology will be depicted in Chapter 6.

3. Literature background

In this chapter I will demonstrate the key terms and definitions of my research area from different dimensions and aspects in order to synthesize the various perspectives. The following terms will be touched: country image, country and place branding, creative class, cultural diplomacy. But why did I turn my focus on the previously mentioned terms? In the following subchapter I will demonstrate the reasoning of my choices among the examined topics.

3.1. Introduction to the main linkages between terms

The cultural aspect of country image is irreplaceable and unique, which is connected to the country originally. But how the different terms chosen to approach the topic are connected to each other in the dimension of culture? In this subchapter the main linkages between concepts and their connection to each other will be revealed what helps the reader to understand the musical aspect of nation image.

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On Figure 2 different interconnection points are depicted which shows that music, art, so the creative class, moreover cultural diplomacy is one of the components of country branding. Musicians are part of the favoured target group of artists who are labelled as opinion leaders in music branding environment according to Ákos Takács, Culture Manager at Red Bull Corp. (See Chapter 6.3.2.). To the Creative Class (Florida, 2002) other members are added as well from the population who create value and able to replicate those innovative solutions on a long term. But the nature of music is to connect these areas with cultural diplomacy as well: music is able to embrace people from different cultures in order to achieve one common aim; besides music is a universal common language that can be received and interpreted by anyone. So cultural diplomacy influences the education system of a country from a domestic perspective, as long as it has a crucial effect on how a given country is evaluated in an international environment.

The first example of modern cultural diplomacy is connected to music. In the cold war around 1956, the American jazz artist, Jason “Dizzy” Gillespie went for a world tour to Eastern Europe and Southeast Asia. In those years the international tense atmosphere enhanced distrust and disregarded communication in international relationships, but Dizzy Gillespie and its band highlighted the love of community and music independent from their ideological view. (Available: Official Web Page of Cultural Diplomacy. Retrieved: 2012 March)

The traditional countries implementing cultural diplomacy are U.S., UK, Canada, France, Sweden and Finland where music culture is more developed than in any other nations. Several studies revealed which analyzed the relationship of democracy and music indicating that music had a powerful effect on the formation of democratic countries. (Woodford, 2005; Mason, 1917; Buchanan, 2006)

3.2. Country Image

In the past few decades national leaders noticed the importance of country image more and more: all countries around the world using brand management techniques (Kotler and Gerner, 2002) in order to differentiate themselves, increase the revenue from tourism, encourage foreign direct investment and motivate export activities. (Papadopoulos, 2004) These perceptions are all aspects of the countries’ brands, since a major aspect of all brands is the imagery or associations that people hold about them.

“Country image means an internal and external opinion and view system pictured from a folk, a nation, a country; the objective and subjective psychological content of heterogenic and generalized value judgement.” (Szeles, 1998, p.124) To simplify, thus the country image means what people from a nation think about themselves and what other people think about them.

The sums of beliefs and impressions people hold about place. Images represent a simplification of a large number of associations and pieces of information connected with a place. They are a product of the mind trying to process and pick out essential information from huge amounts of data about a place.” (Kotler, 1993) The country image is the sum of different believes, ideas, impressions which people carry in them from a country. (Kotler, 1993)

In the theoretical literature there are two different approaches of country image generating a persistent debate among academic circles (Szeles, 1998). According to the first approach country image covers an “umbrella function” , since its elements, components and contextual factors consist of the concrete products, brands, distinguished organizations of a given country. In this case the terms of image and identity are more or less used as the same. According to the other approach the country itself is a diverse, complex product that can be divided to numbers of elements. This approach enhances the view that country image is a regular product image, which has more diverse and complex characteristics as a product.

The main factors influencing country image are the following (Jenes, 2005, pp. 19-20.): geographical, natural resources, social considerations, economic-commercial factors. Other tools, organizations are playing a crucial role in developing a positive country image like embassies, international events, tourism, national PR institutions, brochures and media campaigns.

Shrimp (1993) applied the term ‘country equity’ referring to the emotional value resulting from consumers’ association of a country. A country’s image results from its geography, history, art and music, famous citizens and other features. The enterta...

Table of contents

• The Creative Aspect of Country Branding – How Music Is Able to Influence the Country Image in Case of Hungary
• 1. Introduction
• 2. Research statement and methodology
• 3. Literature background
• 4. Interconnections between Literature
• 5. The Musical Aspect of Country Branding
• 6. Primary research
• 7. Conclusions and Suggestions
• Bibliography
• Appendix 1: The Global Creativity Index (Florida, 2011)
• Appendix 2. Focus Group Interview Guideline
• Appendix 3. Short Introduction of Interviewees
• Appendix 4. Interview Guideline for Attila Bátorfy (Kreatív Magazin) and Weyer, Balázs (Origo)
• Appendix 5. Interview Guideline for Ákos Takács (Red Bull Hungary)
• Appendix 6. Interview Guideline for András Berta (Sziget Office)
• Appendix 7. Interview Guideline for Jávor Delov (Turbo, Random Trip), Balázs Fehér (The Carbonfools), Gábor Lepés (Balkan Fanatik)
• Appendix 8. Interview Guideline for Gábor Újfalusi
• Appendix 9: Questionnaire Design
• Appendix 10. Time Spent for Listening to Music
• Appendix 11. Motivation of Festival Visits
• Appendix 12. Evaluation of Statements
• Appendix 13. Correlations of Questionnaire