Korean firms strengthen marketing strategies to gain UAE market share

A number of South Korean business conglomerates, also called Chaebol, are strengthening their marketing strategies to further gain market share. Hyundai Motors, for one, is beefing up its spending despite the economic battering that is engulfing the auto sector. Earlier this year, it showcased its new products in Detroit auto show, an event which most leading car manufacturers deliberately missed to cut costs. Hyundai was also the only car advertiser during the latest Oscars. In the UAE, a top company official confirmed there is no cut in their marketing budgets. "There is no cutting in advertising or marketing," Isam Abu Nabah, President of Hyundai Motors-UAE, told Emirates Business . "In a sense, the budget will be redirected. Our marketing budget has been redirected to focus on short-term goals, tactical ads, highlighting the added value that we offer." Last year, Hyundai in the UAE registered 60 per cent growth over the previous year. Sales, however, started to drop in December and since then, sales begun to take a further dip. "There has been a reduction somehow on production capacity mainly because of severe declines in European and American market. However, there are other markets like the Middle East and Africa that up to a certain extent have compensated some of the drops," he said. To encourage consumers to purchase, the company intends to highlight the immediate economical features of their products. "At the moment, people would focus on short-term results so the tactical ad is the one that Hyundai is focusing on such as price, trade-in facilities or things that the customer would be interested in this stage," Abu Nabah said. "Somehow, we managed to maintain high percentage of customers who are still interested in buying our vehicles," he said. "There are a number of customers who have shifted from our competitors to Hyundai because people opt for value-for-money deals. People now are very much interested to look for a car that is not expensive, which has good quality and good resale value. We have a clear pricing policy and what also helps us is we have a big range of vehicles from economical to luxury cars." LG Electronics, the flagship company of LG Group, also plans to increase its branding budgets. Yong Nam, LG Electronics Global CEO, in a recent visit to Dubai said LG is set to increase its branding expenditures by a "significant" amount to further gain a bigger market share. He said the company's sales with subsidiaries turnover went up 20.8 per cent last year touching $46bn. The Middle East and Africa accounted for $3.8bn sales or about eight per cent of the company's total revenues. "The region comprises only five per cent of the overall portfolio but sales has been in the range of eight to nine per cent," Nam said. Keep up with the latest business news from the region with the Emirates Business 24|7 daily newsletter. To subscribe to the newsletter, please click here .