According to a new survey from a global consulting firm, Greater Bay Area residents are increasingly willing to visit Hong Kong as a result of the lifted restrictions. The practical issue for Hong Kong, however, is how to raise its own quality of reception to enhance its attractiveness. Prof. Glenn McCartney, Associate Professor of the Department of Integrated Resort and Tourism Management at the University of Macau, was invited to participate in a discussion with other industry experts and listeners on the trends in the travel needs of mainland tourists on Radio Television Hong Kong’s “Backchat”.
The experts agreed that the two major challenges Hong Kong has in attracting mainland tourists are enhancing service quality and providing a better digital experience. Given the growing importance of social media marketing for tourists in the destination awareness stage, actively participating in digital marketing and learning to gain insight into the trends of tourism consumption from social media platforms is a new strategy that Hong Kong can experiment with. Based on the practices in Macau, Prof. Glenn said that during the last three years, not only the Macau Government Tourism Office, but also Macau’s integrated resorts, have embraced social media marketing to draw a steady stream of tourists from the mainland. In addition, the cashless payment mode has been adopted by most tourism enterprises and has received excellent feedback in practice. In terms of service quality, Macau integrated resorts have been praised by mainland tourists for their warm hospitality in a variety of sectors such as gaming, luxury retail, lodging, and F&B, which also established a positive image on social media platforms.
When discussing the opportunities and challenges of Macau and Hong Kong serving as Special Administrative Regions to compete in the mainland tourist market, Prof. Glenn stated that he could see the limitless potential of the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Center in resurrecting Hong Kong’s tourism and MICE industries, and also looked forward to win-win collaboration between Macau and Hong Kong in the Greater Bay Area in tourism development. In terms of Macau’s destination marketing plan, he emphasized the importance of social media in today’s tourist marketing. He believes that Macau’s future tourism marketing strategy should focus more on market segmentation, for example, expanding the target market to second and third-tier cities in mainland, while also taking regional promotion as a long-term strategy.
Sources for news: Radio Television Hong Kong
