How to recruit the best KOLs for attracting Chinese tourists

As you may probably well, know, social media in China is booming and becoming an excellent way for companies to promote their products or their brand, especially when China is just opened from COVID isolation. Here are some figures and facts that can help you to have a better understanding of the market:

• China is the world’s largest social network market with over 1 billion netizens.
• 80% of the Chinese are using social media
• WeChat (often compared to What’s app) is the #1 Chinese social media with over 1,3 billion users worldwide in 2023. It offers voice messages, group talk, video calls and so on…)
• Weibo (very often compared to Twitter) have 584 million subscribers and 58 million daily users

Then, how to increase your awareness on Chinese social media?

One of the best solutions today will be to build an alliance with a key opinion leader. The KOL are social media influencers followed by millions of people in China. When they post something on their account, it is immediately liked by thousands and thousands of people. Then, their voices can be very powerful and seen by the brands as a manner to influence their followers. Most of the KOLs are specialized in one field, for example, tourism, cosmetics or fashion…

How to boost your social media account in China?
????Expert Tips:
1. Make sure you have an official company account, not personal
2. Make posts in Mandarin, not English
3. Create relevant and localized content. Analyze posts metrics
4. Invest in advertising. For example, you can use Display ads or Headlines on Weibo
5. Respond to comments 
6. Cooperate with Chinese KOLs within the same media

The best platform where they can express themselves today is Weibo.

Why influencers can be important for a brand?

Chinese listen carefully to what those leaders have to say. A word they can make or break your resort or hotel.

How Chinese Celebrities can Boost your tourism destination ?

Tourism agencies looking for developing their branding in China should collaborate with a KOL. They have a community very helpful to target a specific community more easily.

Typically, Key Opinion Leaders will use multimedia content such as high-quality pictures and videos to influence their million-sized communities

Why it can be important for the tourism industry?

There are KOL specialized in the tourism industry accustomed to giving feedback on places they visited or hotels they stayed at.

A good post from an influent KOL on the Chinese social network can mean your hotel or agency a big boost in notoriety.

10 ways for a Hotel to attract Chinese tourists

So KOL seem useful enough for you? Take a look at those below, very effective with a very targeted community

1) Advice to travel abroad

出国旅游小贴士

Outbound marketer, this girl shares pictures as well as travel tips with her 136 thousand followers. She often travels abroad and selects pictures from other people on Weibo that she reposts on her wall.

Lovely, isn’t it? Why not travel to France?

2) A piece of travel

一块去旅行

This girl is also sharing her travelling tips with more than 2, 8 million of her followers. She is in Tibet and posts pictures of the landscape. I am pretty sure that some of her followers are going to book a trip to Tibet after viewing her posts and pictures.

Picture of her trip to Tibet :

3) Travel together

一起来旅游

This account by a boy is followed by more than 1 million people.

His goal? Sharing world beauty with his followers. Given the pictures he took, I would give him more than a pass. What about you?

 

 

4) North sea tourism

北海旅游攻略

The aim of this account followed by 37 thousand people is to promote the coastal cities in China. Then on his page, you can find beautiful pictures of beaches as well as information and tips about these places. These days, he focuses more on duty-free shops, and the hottest shopping spots to find around the world. Fancy some luxury shopping in Italy? Well, the Chinese don’t need to look any further.

 

 

5) Complete travel

旅游全资讯

“Travel is an attitude…. I used the camera to record life bit by bit”. Should you be more of a romantic and poetic soul, you might appreciate the eerie ambience of this Weibo, very different from the one mentioned above.

High-quality pictures and magic places are its areas of focus. This is something his 220000 followers seem to enjoy very much! What about you?

 

 

What about using celebrities for your marketing strategy?

Much has been said about the almighty KOL and their millions of followers. I am not just talking about a “few” million here but “many” millions follow or officially, often self-proclaimed KOL. Sure they are undeniably a great influence, but at what cost?

Yaochen, with 77 million followers on Weibo went to New Zealand for her marriage. Not long after this, there has been an increase in inbound Chinese tourists to New Zealand. This is a seemingly good thing for New Zealand tourism.

Now, let’s be realistic, not just anybody can afford a Yaochen or any other “official KOL”. No one but the biggest tourism companies can do it anyway.

As a tourism agency or a hotel, you may want to bet on those mentioned above or others (take a look at that one as well (Travel Queen ).

These, called 达人 (Da Ren )are specialized and passionate. They won’t ask as much as classic KOL will ask (5 stars hotels, Business class flights…) and will take a real interest in what you do.

One or the other, they can be used the same way: inviting them to private events, being your company ambassador, posting content about your destinations and so on…

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