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| A How to Seoul video on riding the subway in Seoul/ Courtesy of Dobbit |
By Kim Se-jeong
How do you ride the subway in Seoul? How do you find a vegetarian restaurant? How do you go skating on the ice rink in front of City Hall?
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| Jerry Kim |
Dobbit, a six-year-old company, creates a series of tourism videos for Seoul.
"We have particularly good views from Southeast Asia," said Jerry Kim, chief strategy officer for Dobbit.
Dobbit's "How to Seoul" video series was recognized by the Seoul Metropolitan
Government for its creativity last year. Dobbit and the city are now working partners, making additional tourist videos.
In 2016, more than 13 million foreign tourists visited the capital. The number dipped in 2017 due to a sudden decline in Chinese tourists, but the Chinese tourist gap was met by tourists from other Asian countries and other regions.
With the rising number of tourists and diverse origins of the tourists, the city government has been responding with policies to accommodate them.
"How to Seoul" videos are mostly featured on facebook.com/HowtoSeoul, YouTube and other online tourism venues.
One of the most recent postings was a video of an English-speaking narrator visiting a fortune teller in Seoul. Another posting was about finding vegetarian food in Seoul in which the narrator visits three vegetarian shops and offers information about location, working hours and her feedback.
The videos have been well-received.
Its Facebook page has more than 200,000 followers and collected 196,000 likes.
"We are hoping to make this number reach 1 million," Kim said as to what he projects for 2018.
Kim's team gets ideas for videos through reviews written by viewers and that's why he thinks people's participation is very important.
"Bringing out quality content is the most critical thing," Kim said.
Established six years ago, Dobbit specialized in "how-to" content from the beginning.
"We approached ordinary topics and showed people how to do them," the CEO said. "People are moved by ordinary topics like how to clean a bathroom and come back to watch the video again."
Some videos aimed at providing skills, tips and knowhow, while others were created to make people think.
"One of the recent videos was about children with cancer and artists working on an art piece. This was not a typical how-to video, but it warmed viewers' hearts. I would call this video how to make the world more beautiful," Kim said. This project won Dobitt an award from the government.
Dobbit began focusing on certain themes in its videos. "How To Seoul" was one of the chosen themes. "Our recent topic was marketing and communication. We made videos on how to write a business proposal or how to brainstorm an idea."
Dobbit has many working partners.
It works with new media outlets that share its videos. Kim also says banks have shown interest in featuring their videos on TVs in their reception areas.
"What we want is to make content from which everyone benefits," he said. "Let's say there's a great street food vendor. If I make a video on her cooking and the venue, it will be good for her because it will help her business. And the consumers will benefit because they are informed about a good eatery outlet in Seoul."
Visit sharehows.com to watch the videos.
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