การวิเคราะห์ศักยภาพของผู้ประกอบการเสื้อผ้าสำเร็จรูปชาวไทย ด้านการแข่งขันและการสื่อสารการตลาดเชิงบูรณาการผ่านเครือข่ายสังคมออนไลน์ในตลาดอาเซียน

Thailand is one of the few countries in the world that provides the whole value chain of the textile industry with over 4700 local textile producers and 800000 to one million workers making this industry the second-most important employment sector. In 2016 the industry’s export revenue was valued at almost USD 7 billion contributing to over 3% of total exports. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is the biggest international market for Thailand clothing export (23%) and expected to become the worlds fourth largest market by 2030. However Thai cloth entrepreneurs are facing major problems that demand attention including labour costs new design and product development and in particular online marketing. The Thai fashion and textile industries should define a clear strategic move through integrating textile with fashion with a view “toward sustainable creative industries with strong soft power”. The purpose of this study is to analyse competitiveness of Thai cloth entrepreneurs in relation to online management and integrated marketing communications (IMC) in the ASEAN market. The research instrument involves a descriptive cross-sectional mixed-method study in Thailand. For quantitative data 60 cloth entrepreneurs are invited to complete a questionnaire before and after our “online management and IMC” training programme and a qualitative in-depth interview study is conducted with 10 cloth entrepreneurs. The 2017 survey returned 100% participation with general agreement that a website and Facebook are the most important IMC tools for online marketing in the ASEAN market. Before training the participants had knowledge and skills regarding the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA) online communication and social media tools in intermediate level while they had less knowledge and skills concerning social media web design and online gallery. After training the statistics show an increase in entrepreneurs’ level for all knowledge and skills. Furthermore the findings from in-depth interviews show that with regard to entrepreneurial competitiveness in relation to the ability of online management and IMC there is a requirement for further training and government support. In addition the 10 cloth entrepreneurs agree that time management and quality of product and service control are very important for online business.