As a former Japan OFW, I browse the web on Japan topics such as forums, music, news and other of interest that I could read and refresh my memories. Then I read an interesting news about Japan’s proclamation about an official mascot for their tourism industry. None other than the fictional character mascot created and popularized by Sanrio Company of Japan “Hello Kitty”. Since 1983, and because of children’s love and attraction for the mascot icon, it has held the position as Ambassador for UNICEF till present. But recently it was announced as the new Tourism Ambassador of Japan. Funny as some may think but it is a well deserved appointment as it has served its purpose of bringing joy to both young and old alike.

But for the Philippines, with us fast becoming as one of the top tourism destination in the globe, as announced and recognized by the new 7 wonders of the world, we haven’t had any mascot or national banner logo to promote tourism in the country. Sure we’ve had Pedro in Salakot for decades but it has a hundred or so versions. With the Philippines who has an abundant talent of web creators, designers, artists and cartoonist we could come up with one. Nationalistic idea ? Yes of course and that is where we have to start. Our government could spend some few bucks to support this drive. It could be on our air carriers and embassies with promotions on televisions, public and private offices as well as travel agencies.

It could be the one missing link in order to boost more the attraction of our tourism industry internationally. A lot of our fellow countrymen and women are continuously pumping and constantly promoting our country and we ourselves included, promoting the tourism industry and most of all the beauty of our country. Even expats and OFW’s are trying their best but we could not do this without the support of our own government. Sharing of ideas and the best contribution by our web designers, illustrators, cartoonists and many more are what we need and of course our own government. There are times that we need to be more nationalistic and strive hard for the best. There won’t be any prize waiting on our doorsteps most of the times but surely the Filipino people would benefit and the rest of us. Our country has much to offer for tourism and all we need is a booster.

This is one of the great opportunity for OFW families or loved ones in the Philippines to have a memorable gift on those special occasions besides the usual money remittances. First of all lets talk about the logistics or courier providers. Money remittance centers have sprouted all over the Philippines and became popular because of Pinoys sending their earnings back home. I for one have tried most of the services and the money I sent was instant. It wasn’t long ago that remittances used to take 3-5 days to reach its destination, but thanks to the growing number of pick up points in the Philippines such as banks, jewelry outlets, stores and malls and don’t forget the modernization of the internet too. It has been noted by the Central Bank of the Philippines that as of present, foreign remittance from Overseas Filipinos have remitted and surpassed the 15 billion peso mark even though the exchange rate of the US Dollar has weakened. The Pinoy padala has not been bothered with it and their continuous support for their families back home even grew. Online services have popped up the scene and the affiliates of media giant ABS-CBN even joined the bandwagon for both remittance and box. For money remittances the most popular right now are as follows:

• Western Union
• Xoom
• Money Gram

Sending cargo boxes or most popular as balikbayan boxes of gifts, personal effects, clothes, canned goods or even electronic items have become a phenomenon too. Filipinos overseas loves their family a lot and most, if had a chance, would love to share all the things they have through sending boxes of goods in the Philippines. These logistic providers have come up with this ingenious way of providing Filipino families back home with this kind of support and can be also be delivered to any destination in the country. In our experience we have sent a box of canned goods, clothes, fragrances, juices, chocolates and other imported items that we can share. Very interesting indeed. Some of the popular logistic companies here in the US are as follows:

• Forex
• LBC
• StarKargo

As for online gift sending we have seen a lot and used a few of them. These are services for bulky products such as appliances or electronics, furnitures, packaged good items, jewelries and computers. Most of them are specialized on sending flowers which are good for special occasions and loved ones in the Philippines. It really is a convenient way also of sending a gift through internet payments. A lot of these online services pops up on keyword terms such as Philippine Gifts, Philippine Regalo, Philippine Pasalubong, Philippine On Line Gifts and many more. The services we used so far and have a prompt delivery are the following:

• MyAyala.com
• 22Ban.com

Online marketing has been a major standpoint in the Internet. Many have succeeded and made a descent living out of it. By marketing their different products online they achieve sales and profits. But this depends too on their link popularity and their targeted keywords. Most of the successful ones have thousand of links of different page ranks and have attained the perfect success. Most of them link to quality web directory that have high page rank and strong presence or resource blogs that very well captures an audience. They optimize their sites to get the best featured placement on their targeted keywords which I think the best for a strategy to increase online presence. So if you need some quality back links there are a lot of real estate directory, business directory, shopping directory or a travel directory to choose from.