The Impact of Turkish TV Series on Turkey's Image: Evidence from Eastern Europe

Abstract

Tourism has been one of the fasting growing sectors in Turkey. Turkey is the 6th most popular tourist destination in the world, attracting around 40 million tourists in 2014. The popularity of Turkish television series has skyrocketed in the last decade not only in Turkey but also in many countries especially in Middle Eastern and southern European countries. Turkish TV series serve not only as an export item. TV series also boost the tourism. Moreover, Turkish TV series is an aspect of soft power of Turkey. Therefore, Turkish TV series have various effects in social, economic, tourism, and political aspects. We examine the impact of Turkish TV series in terms of perception, tourism and product preferences in four Eastern European Countries namely Macedonia, Croatia, Bulgaria, and Serbia. For this purpose, survey is conducted by GFK company to 200 (100 male/100 female) university students and 300 (150 male/150 female) non-students in each capital city of those countries. According to survey findings, majority of respondents know at a Turkish TV series. Followers of Turkish TV series has more (less) positive (negative) thoughts about Turkey compared to non-followers. Also, Turkish TV series increases the publicity of Turkey in those countries. While we find a positive effect on tourism destination choice while there is no effect of Turkish TV series on Turkish product purchase behavior.