The Secret to Luring Chinese Travelers? It's All About the Little Comforts
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A commercial set in a Holiday Inn shows a Chinese family snuggling up in bed, with mom, dad and daughter all wearing complimentary hotel slippers. Why focus in on a small thing like slippers? They’re part of a master plan to win over Chinese travelers by getting the details right.
Holiday Inn’s parent company, InterContinental Hotels Group, has made a digital advertising push lately around its hospitality effort for Chinese guests traveling overseas. Short, simple video ads by Ogilvy Shanghai tell stories about the little comforts the hotels offer to Chinese travelers far from home — Chinese dumplings in Paris, a Mandarin speaker at a hotel’s front desk in Seattle, or something as basic as disposable slippers, something Chinese hotel guests look for. The effort to court China’s outbound travelers carries across all the company’s brands, including Crowne Plaza and InterContinental.
China has more overseas travelers than any other market: 135 million in 2016, up 6% from the year before. And China’s tourists spent $261 million on international trips, more than double what Americans spent, according to U.N. tourism statistics. Big international hotel groups are trying to woo them with hospitality programs that offer tea and Chinese-language tourist maps. IHG’s program targeting outbound Chinese tourists is called Zhou Dao, which roughly translates to “InterContinental welcome.”
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