With more than one billion active accounts, WeChat is one of
the most popular marketing channels for brands trying to reach Chinese
consumers.
International travel brands including national tourism
boards, destination marketing organizations, airlines, cruise lines, hotels and
attractions publish content on WeChat with the hopes of attracting the growing
number of Chinese outbound travelers.
Since 2017, Dragon Trail Interactive has tracked travel
brands’ official accounts on WeChat, looking at total view for published articles,
total number of articles, most-viewed articled and “like” on articles (it has
tracked the categories of attractions and hotels only since March 2018).
In its latest report comparing 2018 to 2017, the top 10 airlines and cruise lines
saw significant increases in average views per post - airlines more than 7% and
cruise lines more than 25%.
Air
AirAsia is the leader of the air sector by far, getting nearly
eight million article views in 2018, more than 5.5 times that of the second-place
airline, All Nippon Airways.
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Other than AirAsia, only three airlines got more than
100,000 views for a single WeChat post in 2018: All Nippon Airways, Finnair and
Korean Air.
In analyzing All Nippon Airways’ WeChat strategy, Dragon
Trail Interactive saysz; “Most of its top-ranking articles were about discounted
tickets to Japan, and the airline also took advantage of the strong interest in
travel to Japan in 2018, promoting the appeal of the destination as well as the
flights.
"All Nippon Airways gave followers several opportunities to vote, with
one article asking WeChat users to pick their favorite flight attendant
uniform, and another with voting on one’s favorite in-flight meal.”
For airlines based in the United States, United Airlines
ranked the highest at eighth on the list with nearly 500,000 total views. But United’s
average views per post - just over 4,000 - marked a 78.6% decrease compared to
2017.
Cruise
In the cruise sector, Royal Caribbean remained on the top of
the list for the second year, with more than 2.6 million total views for its
WeChat posts and an average of more than 15,600 views per post.
But Costa
Cruises, which ranked third in 2017, dropped to seventh place in 2018, and moving
up the rankings were Viking Cruises and Dream Cruises, taking over second and
third places, respectively.
Regarding Viking’s dramatic increase of more than 218% in
average article views, Dragon Trail Interactive says: “The account has posted
50% more articles in 2018 than the year before. Second, Viking started the year
with a very well-received and long-running competition that got lots of people
involved with the brand account, giving winners the chance to take their
parents on a Rhine River cruise.
"Thirdly, the articles are beautiful, with lots
of large, vibrant photos, maps and clear information about their products.
Fourthly, European river cruises - Viking’s product - are a growing market for
Chinese outbound travelers. And finally, Viking has invested significantly into
WeChat advertising.”
New categories
Museums and attractions and hotels are two new categories
Dragon Trail Interactive has been tracking since the second quarter of 2018.
Hong Kong theme parks Disneyland and Ocean Park led the rankings
for museums and attractions, with the Louvre, the National Gallery of Victoria
in Melbourne and Versailles rounding out the top five.
“Chinese tourists have shown particular interest in Parisian
cultural attractions this year, and this is reflected on WeChat,” says Dragon
Trail Interactive.
For hotels, the analysis found international brands
primarily use their WeChat accounts to post content about properties in China
rather than those overseas.
“However, brand recognition can be important for
international bookings as well, and many of the big-name hotel brands use their
WeChat accounts to promote their membership programs, which extend globally,”
says Dragon Trail Interactive.
Marriott, Starwood, Hilton and Shangri-la rank first through
fourth, averaging about 5,000 to 6,000 views per post. The only
single-property account in the top of the rankings is the Marina Bay Sands in Singapore,
but Dragon Trail Interactive says this is not a sign that overseas hotels
should give up on WeChat.
“Rather than a marketing tool with articles that reach
thousands, hotels can think of WeChat as more of a service and communications
tool, which Chinese guests can use for booking requests, and to get concierge
recommendations, check-in, Wi-Fi and other on-site services to make them feel
at home.”
Dragon Trail Interactive also notes that in December 2018,
WeChat changed its “like” button to a “good looking” button that shares
articles with friends on the platform, so this may improve results for travel
brands in 2019.