Sarawak Tourism Board Building Brand Value Via Events

Text by Laura Lee, Pix by Suchen SK

While I try to recapture what Sarawak Tourism Board (STB) chief executive officer Dato Rashid Khan (pic) shared with us at the media briefing yesterday upon our arrival for the Miri International Jazz Festival (MIJF), I could hear jazz music in the background as the bands tune their instruments and do their sound check ahead of this evening’s performance.

Dato’ Rashid, who is also the chairman of the steering committee, shared with us his strategy of organising events to spur tourism. They include incorporating some of the best corporate practices into government agencies, especially into areas like event management.

He said in the past, the government has provided seed money in the form of grants for such events as RWMF. STB wants to go beyond organising the Rainforest World Music Festival (RWMF) and MIJF.

“We are looking at six additional events that will bring more tourists to the state.”

This will take place by 2011 and will have nothing to do with community events. The new events, all apparently music related, are expected to deliver brand value in the long term like what RWMF and MIJF have done.

They will not be just another government organised event but will be run professionally by experts like its artistic and programme director Randy Raine-Reusch and will have key attractions to make the event big.

Dato’ Rashid said these events must be of high class and world standard as they will be benchmarked against other global events.

“It must do normal things extraordinarily well.”

Why Miri? One of them is to tap on its proximity to Brunei and the foreign nationals who are working and residing there to come to Miri.

Dato’ Rashid is looking at increasing the tourist arrivals to seven million into Sarawak by 2015 under a five-year plan. He said the state’s target for next year is four million tourist arrivals and based his optimism on the cross border traffic from its neighbours like Brunei.

Statistics from Sarawak’s Immigration Department showed a total of 3,280,416 tourist arrivals for 2009, a dip from the 3.61 million reported for 2008.

Dato’ Rashid said Sarawak’s niche would be focused on music, culture and tribal stuff. Plans are afoot to hold these new events during low seasons as this when the private sector require the support most from the government. Such measures will also help to fill up the hotel rooms and contribute to the state’s economic activities.

With tourism’s multiplier effect of almost 12 times, the idea is to organise events that have a sustainable impact where the locals will benefit, he explained.

“The event organiser must also look at the profit and loss. The event should at least break even and not lose money so that we can invest the money to bring in more artistes.”

Dato’ Rashid said STB is exposing its staff to leadership development and has appointed two project managers to run the RWMF and MIJF.

Angelina P Bateman, STB former administration and finance manager, who has been made director of corporate communications and governmental relations, will be MIJF project director while Benedict Jimbau, STB director of marketing will be in charge of the RWMF, which will be held from 9-11 July.

Dato’ Rashid added that the governance process would be looked at to ensure that risk management and environmental issues would be addressed in 2011.

“We do not want to see plastic bottles all over the place.”

MIJF should create an ambience of festivity for the city of Miri rather than be localised in one venue. This, he said are some of the directions and strategic approaches that will be adopted for the forthcoming events.

“We want to make it happen and have asked the hoteliers to reflect the rainforest ambience for the RWMF for at least one to two weeks so that the whole city of Kuching can feel that it is a big happening.”

MAREC10 keynote address fails to set the tone

Soma to speak on day two of Marec10 on getting ready for a liberalised RE market in Malaysia

Text and pix by Laura Lee

Like most of the participants attending the start of the Malaysian Annual Real Estate Convention (Marec) 2010 today, I was looking forward to hear what the keynote speaker Reza Mardani has to say about the “Real Estate Way to Wealth”.

The main point that came out from his keynote address was “How you manage the process of your work is what counts”.

The other thing is your heart has to be there in what you do. Speaking from his experience of dealing with the infrastructure, oil and gas sector and civil areas, his advice to the audience was, “Do not leave your heart out of the deal. Your words have to satisfy your client’s emotions.”

Beyond these pointers, there was not much in his keynote speech. Keynote speakers are often carefully selected as they play a very crucial role in setting the tone of a meeting or convention besides helping to draw more participants to join the event.

They are usually someone who is well known in their field and recognised by many for their accomplishments.

According to Wikipedia, “the term key note comes from the practice of a cappella, often Barbershop singers, playing a note before singing. The note played determines that key in which the song will be performed”.

I understand in Reza’s case, he was very much a last minute selection as the copy of the convention programme sheet that was given out and the souvenir programme that was placed on our tables after lunch both has no mention of his name at all while the rest of the other speakers’ name for the two-day convention were all listed out.

When I tried to find out at the end of the convention on the first day from the staff manning the counter and certain key people from the Malaysian Institute of Estate Agents (MIEA) what his name and designation were, none of them seemed to know.

I finally came across a girl, who had registered us media in the morning, who knew how our keynote speaker’s name was spelt as she had written his name on a card.

My request to find out the keynote speaker’s designation later came to the attention of the MIEA president who called my mobile to inform me that the keynote speaker was Asbanas Sdn Bhd’s operations director who heads the overseas business of oil and gas as well as commodities for the Middle East, America and Europe.

The next session on Live Your Dream by Datuk Jimmy Lim Thaw Chay saved the day!

After a brief introduction about him being Holiday Villa Ampang’s owner and his involvement in other projects such as Amcorp Mall and Lot 86 Ampang in Kuala Lumpur (KL), MIEA immediate past president Soma Sundram Krishnaswamy (pic) and Siva Shanker, who is in charge of the speaker’s programme, conducted an interesting dialogue between themselves and filled us in with insightful details about Lim.

Siva tells us that Lim attributed his success during his days at the corporate helm to SW, which means “simply whack”. Apparently, Lim also likes to keep his management style simple so that it is workable. As such, his talk and advice would also be simple so that we can understand him.

One such simple advice from Lim is, “Earn your money where your strength is and KL is your best bet for homes.”

Soma continued and shared with the audience Lim’s strategies for success. They include adopting an intensive land use of his development projects whereby he would work on two projects at a time in order to derive more efficiency in terms of design and cost.

To Lim, extensive development is not good as purchasers are just a number in your books. He believes in providing convenience to the purchasers, which will make them more appreciative of the developer.

On what he thinks about financing, Siva informs us that Lim uses very little leasing or borrowing. Hence, his companies can withstand the surges in the economic turbulence and are able to take advantage of the opportunities that arise.

Lim believes in working closely with EAs when he conducts a sales launch for his projects. For estate agents who have prospective land to introduce to Lim, take note that he only builds on freehold land and one that is in the right location gives an even better price.

Since buying a property often represents the single biggest expenditure or commitment for the buyer, Lim believes in giving the buyer “not a property but a home he can call it his or her own”.

The banter between the Siva and Soma on Lim’s replies got a wee bit carried away. I was starting to wonder whether is it because our next speaker won’t be showing up.

My fears were allayed when they finally gave the floor to Lim but not before telling us where Lim predicts where the future growth areas in the Klang Valley will be.

With KL located in the valley, the growth direction will be constricted. The pull will be towards Putrajaya and Klang. For residential, the areas identified are OUG, Bukit Jalil, Puchong to Kajang and the fringe of Putrajaya. For commercial, it is Shah Alam, Klang to Puchong.

The second growth area will be the Kesas Highway, Port Klang while the third growth area will be towards the Guthrie Corridor.

Although Petaling Jaya, Shah Alam and Putrajaya have lots of spare land due to sanitisation and leasehold status, Lim said these could be changed dramatically if the government starts to allow changes of land use conditions such as converting leasehold land to freehold.

Watch out also for the international zones such as Ampang, Titiwangsa and Bukit Jalil as they have the potential for immediate explosive growth.