South Korea and Japan were the most popular destinations for Chinese tourists in 2023

Chinese People has planned to travel first in Asia, and South Korea + Japan were the principal destinations for Chinese tourists during their spring holidays.

Increasingly more Chinese tourists are travelling to South Korea and Japan to take advantage of products at lowest prices.

There are some reasons why Chinese travelers have preferred South Korean and Japan as their holiday destinations instead of exotic places such as Thailand, Indonesia or Philippines.

The main reasons are the political instability in Thailand due to the coup d’etat and the protests which have strongly affected the image of the country. And other reason is that Chinese tourists spend a huge part of their holidays in shopping and South Korea and Japan are countries where they can buy goods at lowest prices thanks to duty-free stores in these countries.

Asia is closer and more developped

Despite the efforts of Europe and North America in order to attract Chinese tourists, Asia continues being the world leader destination for Chinese travelers.

In 2019 (before pandemic) around 116 million Chinese tourists traveled abroad and 85.4 million of them traveled across the whole Asia while only 3.4 million Chinese tourists visited Europa and around 2,7 million Chinese travelers chose Africa as their holiday destination.

Sout Korea:

China has some special Administrative Regions such as Hong Kong and Macau which have been the top destinations for Chinese tourists outside mainland China. Nonetheless, outside China,  South Korea has become the most popular destination for Chinese travelers with an approximate 6.1 million total tourists from China for 2023

S. Korea is celebrating Lunar New Year, or Seollal, and Chinese in particular, usually celebrate the year’s first long holiday by traveling abroad, specially after 3 years of being bloced in China with Zero Covid policy.

it’s not surprising that Korea is taking steps to attract those Chinese tourists.

So Korea is definitely bound to see a lot of Chinese tourists and Korean retailers are desperate to have them Back as customers, Chinese crazy Shoppers are OF COURSE welcomed in Korea

South Korea has become an attractive country for Chinese visitors since 2015-2016 due to their obsession with “Hallyu” also known like the Korean wave, referring to the strong influence popularity and of South Korean pop culture since the late 1990s.

VISA FREE use to help

The visa-free travel for those Chinese tourist who desire visit Jejudo island is another reason why South Korea is popular among Chinese travelers together with the lower products prices that they can find in the the Korean country.

Japan:

These are good news for a country that suffered a strong drop of Chinese visitors between 2017 and 2019 as a consequence of Chinese anti-Japan riots and boycotts besides the Senkaku Islands dispute between the Asian giant and Japan.

Japan was a particularly attractive retail destination due to the weak yen which meant very low prices. In addition, last year, Japan added cosmetics to its list of duty-free products and many Chineses decided travel to the country to purchase those goods such as the prestigious Sisheido brand.

How to attract Chinese tourists in Japan (we share our secrets)

Why are they the favorite destinations for Chinese travelers?

Well, it’s no secret, Chinese consumers love luxury goods and will be more likely to prefer luxury-related destinations like France, Italy or… South Korea and Japan. However the latter have an advantage : they are much closer to China than others. This liking for close-to-home luxury products drove them to both countries as surely as bees are attracted to honey. There they have the opportunity to buy duty-free high-end products.

However, hotels, stores, restaurants and travel agencies have to adapt their services to Chinese tourists to provide them high-quality services in order to keep these visitors.

How to attract Chinese tourists?

• Social media , like Wechat
• Website in Chinese
• Chinese Search Engine Marketing
• online Reputation Management
• communicate on Travel platforms

The most effective way to attract Chinese tourist is having a presence on Chinese internet.

Companies have to create a Chinese website and have a presence on Baidu, the largest search engine in China.

If a company has no presence on Baidu, it is almost impossible for Chinese users to find the company.

Stil, being indexed on Baidu is far from enough, you have to know how to rank high, amongst the first results pertaining to your product offer. For this, only one solution : Baidu SEO.

The next step is having presence on social media platforms. Chinese tourists don’t make any decision related to their trips without searching for information online first related to destinations, hotels, restaurants and points of interest.

They trust more in information they find on social networks that information provided by direct adverts coming from the companies.

Therefore, companies must develop a marketing strategy in China in order to reach a major number of Chinese tourists and attract them.

If you are interested to increase the number of Chinese tourist, don’t hesitate to contact us.

How to attract Chinese tourists with the Digital?