products of the business but is an important part, supporting and creating conditions for the direct labor departments to be able to create products that meet the requirements of tourists. This department usually includes permanent security guards, cleaning staff, environmental staff, repair and maintenance of electricity and water, goods supply, and janitors in tourism businesses.
1.1.4.5. Political and social factors
A peaceful and friendly political atmosphere will stimulate the development of international tourism. A world of political instability, ethnic and religious conflicts that affect tourism development means that it does not fulfill its "mission" for tourism, causing skepticism and fear for tourists. In addition, civil wars and wars of aggression destroy tourism resources and architectural works of art created by humans. Natural disasters also have a negative impact on tourism development. Tsunamis, earthquakes, and volcanoes have more or less affected the development of this "smokeless" industry (Nguyen Minh Tue, 1999).
1.1.5. Psychological characteristics of Russian tourists
1.1.5.1. Factors influencing Russians to travel abroad
With the quality of life improving, income increasing and more time spent on travel during the year (Russian people now have 2 weekends, 20 days of annual leave, 10 days of holidays, summer vacation and 2 winter vacations), the number of people traveling, especially traveling abroad (outbound) is increasing rapidly (Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, 2012).
Because Russia is located near the Arctic Circle and doesn't have much sunshine, they like to go to areas with hot and humid climates, especially beautiful beaches, to enjoy the sunshine and the scenery.
The Russian program “Russia Extreme” introducing tourism activities in the world has had a great impact on the travel needs of the people of this country. In addition, the large Vietnamese community living in Russia will also be a positive bridge in attracting Russian tourists to Vietnam.
1.1.5.2. Some typical characteristics of social psychology and consumer behavior of Russian tourists
According to the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism (2012), Russia is very proud of its long-standing cultural traditions. Russians love performances at the grand theater, preferring to watch opera, music, ballet or drama at the grand theater rather than going to the movies. In communication, Russians are quite open, their personalities are quite strong, straightforward, and intelligent. In daily life, Russians are hard-working, diligent, and more natural and humorous than Westerners.
Russian tourists often have the habit of package tours, spending time focusing on rest, relaxation and other tourism services that they need to care about. Russian tourists, besides vacationing, are often very interested in sea sports tourism services at tourist destinations. Participating in and experiencing sea sports services is a decisive factor in choosing a destination for Russian tourists at the present time. Besides, Russian tourists are also very interested in entertainment and supplementary tourism products at destinations. Russian tourists' preference is resort tourism, especially beach resorts. When traveling, Russian tourists often choose destinations with many resorts and high-quality hotels for vacation, at the same time, it is an opportunity for them to have the opportunity to live closer to nature, escape the hustle and bustle of urban life that they often have to endure. In terms of taste, Russians are quite simple in eating. Their meals are usually not elaborate. Russian tourists like to eat soups with meat, like roasted dishes, smoked fish, like to use a lot of butter, are used to drinking fresh milk, like to eat vegetables and especially like to drink Vodka. When traveling to the beach, tourists really like to enjoy seafood (Dao Viet Ha, 2011).
In addition, Russian tourists often travel abroad with their families. While traveling, Russian tourists love to buy souvenirs (silk, honey, gold jewelry, etc.). In general, Russian tourists know little or no foreign languages, so the number one criterion in choosing a tour is the tour guide and staff who can speak Russian. Destinations must have staff who can speak Russian to
communication and service, making people feel comfortable, satisfied and creating a better impression for the destination as well as during the tour (Nguyen Quoc Tien, 2015).
Table 1.6: Some countries with high spending on international tourism in 2015, 2016
TT
Nation | 2015 ( billion USD ) | 2016 ( billion USD ) | Average growth rate (%) | |
1. | China | 250 | 261 | 104.4 |
2. | USA | 112.9 | 122 | 108.1 |
3. | Virtue | 77.5 | 81 | 104.5 |
4. | United Kingdom | 63.3 | 64 | 101.1 |
5. | France | 38.4 | 41 | 106.7 |
6. | Russia | 35 | 49 | 140 |
7. | Canada | 29.4 | 29 | 98.6 |
8. | Korea | 25 | 27 | 108 |
9. | Australia | 23.5 | 27 | 114.8 |
10. | IDEA | 24.9 | 25 | 100.4 |
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Source: UNWTO 2016
According to a study by the Vietnam Institute for Tourism Development Research (2015), the total estimated spending per Russian visitor is about 635 Euros or 60 Euros per night for an average 10-11 day trip. In this study, Russians ranked 3rd in the world after Japan and the US, accounting for 10% of total spending. Russia is considered a market with increased spending and high spending capacity in recent years. However, due to the impact of the economic recession, the devaluation of the RUB, economic sanctions and political fluctuations, etc., the spending of Russian visitors when traveling abroad has been affected.
Russian tourists often have the habit of carrying cash to pay directly for all service costs and shopping. They are very afraid of the inconvenience of paying for expenses outside the tour, so they mainly carry cash for convenience. On the contrary, Russian tourists are also very afraid of carrying a lot of cash on their person because of the safety and security factor for them during the trip, so this is a factor that destinations need to pay attention to in order to commit.
Minimizing risks for Russian tourists is also a factor contributing to promoting the growth of Russian tourists to each destination (Dao Viet Ha, 2011).
500,000
433,987
400,000
364,873
338,843
300,000
298,126
200,000
174,287
100,000
0
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
Chart 1.1: Number of Russian visitors to Vietnam in the period 2012 - 2016
(Unit: Number of visitors)
( Source: General Statistics Office 2016 )
According to statistics from the World Tourism Organization UNWTO (2016), there were 34 million Russian tourists traveling abroad. However, our country has only welcomed 433 thousand Russian tourists, which is only 1.2% of the total number of Russian tourists traveling abroad (according to the General Department of Tourism). Meanwhile, in some neighboring countries, this number is much larger. That partly proves the fact that the ability to attract Russian tourists to Vietnam is still weak, not really effective and thereby also shows that this is a potential market for Vietnamese tourism in the coming time.
Visit
Vacation
Other purposes
Chart 1.2. Purpose of Russian tourists' foreign travel
(Source: www.ratanews.ru )
1.2. Experience in attracting Russian tourists in some countries and in Vietnam
1.2.1. Experiences of some countries in the world in attracting Russian tourists and lessons learned
1.2.1.1. Experience of Istanbul - Türkiye
According to Nguyen Quoc Tien (2015), in recent years, the number of Russian tourists to Turkey has increased rapidly. As of November 2016, the number of Russian tourists to Turkey reached about 2.45 million.
One of the favorite destinations for Russian tourists when visiting Türkiye is Istanbul. This is the largest city in Turkey and the only city in the world located on two continents, Asia and Europe, stretching along both sides of the Bosphorus Strait, separating Europe and Asia. Istanbul was once the capital of three different empires: the Roman Empire (330-395), the Byzantine Empire (395-1453) and the Ottoman Empire (1453-1923). Istanbul is famous worldwide for its more than 2,600 years of history, many ancient architectural works, many magnificent mosques and palaces, with a vibrant and rich urban life, attracting millions of tourists from all over the world to come here every year. The unique feature of Istanbul is the cultural fusion between Europe and Asia with majestic mosques, the colors of traditional markets, the delicious cuisine from familiar dishes such as Doner Kebab, fish sandwiches or kidney bean soup to green peppers stuffed with lamb, honey... Therefore, Istanbul attracts millions of tourists to visit and is likened to a "very strong magnet" (attractive destinations such as: Market
Grand Bazaar, Hagia Sophia Museum, Blue Mosque Park, Taksim Square, underground Basilica Cistern, Dolmabahce Palace, Topkapi Palace...
1.2.1.2. Spain's experience
According to Nguyen Quoc Tien (2015), to attract international tourists in general and Russian tourists in particular, Spain has proposed a number of attractive solutions such as:
- Creating impressive tourism slogans: In recent times, Spanish tourism has seen the emergence of a number of slogans such as “Green Spain”, “Gateway to the Mediterranean”, “Silver Route”, “World Heritage City”, “Happy Spain”, most recently “Spanish Imprint” which has attracted many tourists, especially Russian tourists, who enjoy swimming, relaxing and sunbathing.
- Building good relationships with international media: To let people around the world know about its tourism, Spain has established relationships with international media to build articles about Spanish tourism with the impression of a friendly Spain, a destination that is always new, dynamic and full of sunshine.
- Regularly organize Famtrips with potential and key markets: Spain has identified the Russian tourist market as a potential market, so the country's tourism industry has organized Famtrips for Russian businesses to come and explore and expand the market .
- Building websites with the latest information: The Spanish Tourism Organization has built a website: www.spain.info to provide information to tourists (supporting many different languages). Thanks to that, tourists can easily access Spanish tourism information and buy tourism products online.
1.2.1.3. Thailand's experience
According to Ha Van Hoi (2011), with the method of "consuming services outside the territory", Thai tourism has proposed the following policies to promote attracting tourists to the country:
- Pay attention to building strategies, plans and policies to promote tourism development;
- Increase investment and development of tourism infrastructure;
- Eliminate hassles and worries for travelers during their travels;
- Have reasonable service pricing policy;
- Strengthen tourism marketing with government participation.
Therefore, despite experiencing many geopolitical fluctuations, economic recession, epidemics, etc., Thailand is still an attractive destination for many countries around the world. According to ASEAN statistics, in 2015, the number of tourists to Thailand was 24,799,800, second only to Malaysia with 27,437,300; Vietnam was
7,874,300 visitors (Nguyen Xuan Thien - Ha Minh Tuan, 2016).
* Lessons learned:
Through studying the practical experience of some countries in the world and in the region in attracting and serving Russian tourists, we can draw some lessons for Vietnam tourism as follows:
- It is necessary to identify the work of building a brand, promoting and positioning the image to the Russian market as the most important task. In which, it is necessary to position with impressive slogans, typical of tourism products that the Russian market has high demand for.
- Focus on developing and providing the Russian tourist market with high-end tourism products and high-quality services with enjoyment being the top priority, while ensuring the reasonableness between product quality, service and price.
- Facilitating tourists in accessing information and using tourism products and services, in immigration procedures has a great influence and creates motivation in attracting Russian tourists. Language is a big barrier for Russian tourists in accessing tourism information and has a great impact on tourists' satisfaction during their trip.
- Establishing a tourism representative in Russia as well as building and maintaining relationships with Russian travel agencies is a necessary task, contributing significantly to the development of tourism.
important in providing and answering tourist information of the destination as well as implementing tourism promotion programs to potential markets.
1.2.2. Experience in attracting Russian tourists in Khanh Hoa and Binh Thuan
1.2.2.1. Overview
According to Nguyen Quoc Tien (2015), to attract Russian tourists, Khanh Hoa province has proactively invested in infrastructure, technical facilities; shopping and entertainment venues; tourism human resources, focusing on training Russian language programs for tourism staff of the province with the support of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism. In addition, focusing on building the image of the destination to attract tourists to the land of "Agarwood", especially Russian tourists.
In 2016, Khanh Hoa's tourism revenue reached 8,300 billion VND, up 20% compared to 2015, reaching 107% of the plan. The number of international visitors to Khanh Hoa (mainly Nha Trang) reached more than 1 million, up 123% over the same period; Russian visitors alone were about 260 thousand.
For Binh Thuan province, according to the provincial Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, tourism activities in the province continue to develop. The quality of tourism services and travel activities continues to improve; the whole province has 43 travel businesses, including 05 international travel businesses; entertainment services such as windsurfing, kite surfing, jet skiing, off-road motorbikes, etc. are increasingly developing, contributing to diversifying tourism products and services. Accommodation facilities are constantly developing and improving quality; in 2015, the whole province currently has 271 accommodation facilities in operation, with a total of more than 10,300 rooms. There are 171 accommodation facilities/6,858 rooms that have been ranked; of which, 3 facilities/348 rooms are ranked 5 stars; 22 facilities/2,214 rooms are ranked 4 stars; 12 facilities/891 rooms are ranked 3 stars. Attracted about 500 thousand international visitors to the province, an increase of 13.4% compared to 2014, of which Russian tourists alone accounted for 30.97%, ... the total number of international visitors to the province.
1.2.2.2. Lessons learned
From the experiences of the two localities above, some lessons can be drawn as follows: