WTCF Hosts Panel Discussion and Invited Guests to Share Their Practical Marketing Experience

On the afternoon of the first day of ITB, March 6, Berlin local time, WTCF hosted the themed panel discussion with the topic of “How To Market Your Destination’s Products And Services To Chinese Outbound Tourists?”. The seminar discussed the ways on how to combine the core values of destinations with Chinese social media to create exponentially disseminating effects against the sprouting number of China’s online celebrities and fast-growing social app backdrop. Alice He, Chinese Social Media Manager, Edinburgh Tourism Action Group; Jenny Cai, Director, PR& Media Department, World Tourism Cities Federation (WTCF); Roger Qiu, General Manager of EMEA Destination Marketing, Ctrip; Manuel Viñuelas, International Promotion & Mice, Sevilla Tourism; and Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Arlt, Director, COTRI China Outbound Tourism Research Institute, and WTCF expert, were invited to attend the forum. Richard Matuzevich, Senior Manager, Liaison Department, World Tourism Cities Federation (WTCF), moderated the meeting and introduced the process and meaning of this discussion.

The Panel Discussion

The panelists shared their successful marketing cases in the Chinese market. Jenny Cai, Director, PR& Media Department, World Tourism Cities Federation (WTCF), expressed her own perspectives on how overseas destinations market their products and services in the Chinese market. She also elaborated on the related services WTCF provides as an international tourism organization in offering a marketing platform for its member’s destination products through the examples of tripartite cooperative cases among Sina, Tencent, and WTCF city members with WTCF.

By attending this panel discussion, many WTCF member cities, commercial institutions, and hotels have learned the great influence that social media applications have on the lives of Chinese youths, the prevalent interaction ways among Chinese youngsters, and the importance of online celebrities (opinion leaders), and when they lead the fashion trends. The discussion has strengthened their determination and confidence in utilizing the internet mindset to remodel the traditional tourism industry, and also helped Chinese travel institutions find the blind spots and bottlenecks of the overseas cities marketing in the Chinese tourism field, discover new business opportunities, and make clear of their future development. The forum ended after an enthusiastic discussion and lots of laughter.