Online ads are more effective than social media in targeting Chinese travel consumers
Childs: “No one told Chinese consumers that ads are bad”
Online ads rather than social media is the most effective way of targeting Chinese travel consumers, media agency OMD and MyTravelResearch.com told a forum yesterday.
Speaking at Mumbrella’s Travel Marketing Summit, Carl Mclean, head of insights at OMD Australia and Carolyn Childs, director of MyTravelResearch.com noted that while Australians prefer to find their travel inspiration though social media, Chinese consumers tend to make travel decisions based more on online ads and mobile apps.
According to their research, Chinese consumers clicked on ads 54% of the time, as opposed to the Australian consumer that only clicks on ads 34% of the time.
“No one told Chinese consumers that ads are bad,” said Childs.
“Chinese people do not have the discomfort about commercial information that we have in Australia.”
“They care whether they trust you, but if you’re a trusted entity then definitely they will be prepared to listen to the messages you have.”
Other findings revealed that travel applications were also an extremely important tool for the Chinese market, with 73% of consumers using them as a source of travel information as opposed to 36% of Australian travel consumers.
Culture differences, reasons for travel and VISA processing procedures were also brought to attention as key components in understanding consumer behaviour.
Zoe Samios
