What is the right lead generation strategy for a travel Agency in China?
Are you a travel agency trying to enter the Chinese market? We can totally understand your desire as China is the biggest outbound market in the world. However, it should be noted that if you want to build a viable travel agency in China you will have to tailor your strategy and mainly go online.
Let’s start first with a definition of lead generation…
Lead generation is a term referring to attracting visitors and turning them into potential customers.
A lead would be for example a company or a website visitor who asked for a brochure. It could also be someone who asked for a callback.
These leads all have something in common: you have access to their personal information such as email address, name, phone number or even address. These pieces of information enable you to dive in deeper and contact them with a tailored offer.
Digital : best way to get leads in China 2024 update
Internet is the key. Yes, China is one of the most connected country in the world. It is estimated that there are more than 1 billion netizens in Mainland China alone. This accounts for about half of the population. They also spend about 40% of their 25 hour/week on the Internet.
Xiaohongshu or little Red book, Social media Marketing
Xiaohongshu, often referred to as the “Instagram of China,” is a social media and e-commerce platform that combines user-generated content, community engagement, and online shopping, making it a potent tool for both B2B and B2C marketing.
Here are 7ways Xiaohongshu can be effectively used to attract tourists and generate leads 😉 :
-
Visual Storytelling: Harness the power of vivid, authentic visuals to showcase destinations and experiences, enticing tourists with real-life imagery and stories.
-
User Reviews a: Leverage user-generated reviews and recommendations to build trust and credibility, influencing both individual consumers and business clients’ travel decisions.
-
Influencer Collaborations: Partner with popular Xiaohongshu influencers to reach a broader audience, utilizing their followers to boost visibility and engagement.
-
Localized Content: Create content that resonates with the Chinese market, tailoring messages to reflect local tastes and cultural nuances, enhancing relevance and appeal.
-
Interactive Campaigns: Launch interactive campaigns that encourage user participation, such as contests or hashtag challenges, to engage potential tourists and business partners actively.
-
Travel Insights and Tips: Share useful travel tips and insights, establishing your brand as a knowledgeable and reliable source in the travel industry.
-
Direct Booking Links: Utilize Xiaohongshu’s e-commerce capabilities to provide direct booking options, simplifying the process for consumers and driving direct business engagement.
We have done this campaign generating 80 leads per month
By integrating these strategies, businesses can effectively use Xiaohongshu to not only attract tourists but also engage in meaningful B2B and B2C interactions, leveraging the platform’s vast user base and interactive features.
Tiktok massive traffic & Leads
Douyin, known internationally as TikTok, is a dynamic video-sharing platform that excels in short-form, creative travel content, making it a powerful tool for captivating and engaging audiences in both B2B and B2C contexts.
So you can find our Tips for Douyin can be effectively utilized to attract tourists and generate leads:
-
Scenes Content: beautiful video, easy to do .. Offer exclusive sneak peeks into attractions or experiences, providing a wonderful view
-
Live Streaming – Events: Utilize live streaming features to broadcast events or tours in real-time, creating a sense of urgency and immediacy that encourages immediate engagement from viewers.
-
User-Generated Content Campaigns: Encourage users (or KOL) to share their own experiences with specific hashtags, creating viral campaigns that build organic buzz and widespread visibility.
-
Tailored Ads for Target Segments: Employ Douyin’s advanced targeting tools to deliver tailored advertisements to specific demographic groups, ensuring that content is highly relevant and effectively reaches potential tourists or business clients.
-
Interactive Challenges and Competitions: Launch challenges or competitions that prompt user interaction and content creation, driving engagement while spreading brand awareness organically.
-
Educational Content about Destinations: Provide valuable, educational content that informs users about destinations, showcasing unique cultural, historical, or natural elements to enhance attraction and interest.
- Be consistent... Do again and again.
By leveraging Douyin’s unique features and vast user base, businesses can create a compelling and effective strategy to attract tourists and leads in a way that is both engaging and visually compelling, thus maximizing their reach and impact in the Chinese market.
Website & SEO -SEM in Chinese
The first step to reach these customers should be by creating a website. Your website should follow a kind of “protocol” to ensure that it will be easily found and has a nice feel and touch for the Chinese visitor.
You should also, just like Tnooz author said in his article, be available for your Chinese visitors. The best would be to have a 24-hour customer service able to reply to any queries around the clock. You can use several features like Tour From Bali (see below) did by installing and dedicating a team for an online live Chat.
Tour From Bali Case Study.
Outline: An Indonesian tourist agency has contacted us to reach more Chinese travellers. At that time they were new in-game and have the ambition to succeed in their market.
Campaign: The GMA team has accepted the assignment and lured a multi-channel strategy. We have started with a website migration, PR and undercover marketing campaigns. After the new Chinese website was ready we focused on Baidu SEO and PPC to bring more traffic. Besides, we have worked on Tour From Bali’s Weibo and WeChat official accounts. The main focus was on providing beautiful content, storytelling and reaching more engagement from followers.
Results: a 12-month campaign has made a Tour From Bali the #1 travel agency for Chinese tourists to their destination: 400 000 UV of their website with 30 000 generated Chinese leads.
Visibility – Traffic
If you want to be visible on the Chinese web, you have to be searchable. To be searchable, you have to rank high on the most used search engine in China, which is Baidu. As other western search engines are not allowed by China Great Firewall, Baidu, a Chinese search engine owns 80% of search engine market shares. They have more than 650 million mobile search users. Needless to say, if you rank on the first or at the first, the second page, you will have access to a huge pool of traffic.
Guide to Baidu SEO – China #1 Search Engine
In order to rank high on Baidu, you have to use relevant keywords on your website and generally optimise your website for Baidu. Also, be aware of specific Baidu requirements which align with Chinese government regulations (some content is forbidden for example).
Another way to have a better rank in Baidu is to use internal and external backlinks which will allow you to raise Baidu’s trust “fund”. Finally, you can use PPC (pay-per-click) which is the fact of paying to rank higher on a set of keywords.
As you can see here if you go on Baidu and type “travel agency”, Omega Travel ranks first in the result even though it is a foreign company.
Engage with your followers through other social media
It is estimated that about 9 out of 10 Chinese netizens own at least one account on social media. Just like search engines, China has its own version of social media platforms. The most famous social media in China are WeChat, Weibo, Qzone, QQ and Ren Ren. WeChat is an audio/text instant messaging app which offers special features to businesses if needed. There are more than 690 million WeChat users all around the world. As for Weibo, it is a microblogging platform just like Twitter in western countries. They have more than 222 million active users. If you want to truly connect with Chinese customers you will have to be present on WeChat and Weibo. You can create on both platforms an official/verified account which will offer you special features.
On WeChat, you can send push notifications to your followers and share valuable content in text, video or images. In order to create leads, you have to publish relevant, interesting content that will push Chinese social media users to share, comment or like. Engage them and some of them may just be leads for your travel agency.
You see here the official account of Omega Europe, it provides contact information as well as the fact that they work around the clock. Don’t forget to use all your social media platforms to cross-advertise your other accounts or your website by sharing your WeChat / Weibo QR code both online and offline.
Be aware of your online reputation
Finally, now that you have a strong following base and an important volume of traffic on your website and social media platforms, you have to take care of your reputation online. Why? Because of certain strong Chinese cultural values, more specifically called the “Face” or Mian Zi in Chinese (面子), being linked and engaging with something having a bad reputation will strongly affect their own reputation and honour.
You can build a strong e-reputation by collaborating with a local marketing agency which will make sure that negative comments are hardly findable on Baidu. You can also participate on blogs and forums to make sure that your travel agency has a good image. There are several forums you could join such as LVmama, Qyer or Douban.
You can use the forum LVmama for example (see below)
Another good idea is to do some online PR and post online press releases to communicate about your travel agencies’ destinations and services. You have for example Sina or Travel Sohu for the most famous ones.
Do you want to generate more Chinese leads?
We are Experts in Chinese E-Tourism!
Contact us now to get a Free Consultation or tailor a great Campaign for you
Good content. Love it.
Hope will inspire all travel agencies from all over the world.
A super article Thank you.
I am a Tour operator in Egypt and want more Chinese tourists ? can you send me your price, and case studies please
We are trying to reach Chinese tourists looking to Africa for hunting safaris. We have several Safari Education courses specific to African animals and hunting, intended to increase firearms safety and accuracy while on hunt and give a feeling of preparedness to the hunter before they arrive. We particularly want to reach the younger market of hunters who are less experienced, or have never hunted or handled a firearm before. The courses are $150USD each and are all online. The videos are hosted by wildlife journalist, Craig Boddington.
How could you help us?
The landscape of outbound tourism from China has undergone significant transformation over the years, becoming a vital component of the global travel and tourism sector. As the middle class has expanded in China, so has the appetite for international travel, with specific preferences for luxury shopping, unique accommodations, and distinctive experiences shaping the sector. Here’s a focused analysis on various aspects of outbound Chinese tourism, including hotel preferences, destination marketing, luxury retail shopping, travel agencies, and a summary of how destinations like Australia, Japan, Thailand, the UK, USA, and Canada are catering to Chinese tourists.
Your deep dive into lead generation techniques is exactly what I needed. Fantastic content!