KAHINI CHAKRABORTY – Mumbai
The Hong Kong Tourism Board (HKTB) is looking at adopting a strategic marketing approach to capitalise on India’s positive market potential and economic outlook. For the India market, the tourism board will continue to focus on key growth cities of New Delhi and Mumbai, as well as extend its promotional efforts to South Indian cities of Chennai and Bengaluru. Talking to Express Travelworld, Sunil Puri, India representative, Hong Kong Tourism Board said, “The key segments that we will focus on are youth and family. HKTB will also step up its promotions in India for the MICE business, especially the corporate meetings and incentive segments. We will leverage on a multi-media approach and integrated tactical promotions through collaboration with trade and media to showcase the elements of HK Asia’s World City to build awareness, sustain interest and drive visitor arrivals.”
In the year ahead, HKTB plans to increase investment in the region, and intensify promotion, riding on various mega events and activities, especially those taking place in summer and winter. Further, HK$ 12.5 million of the 2012-2013 total marketing budgets has been allocated for the India market, which is 6.8 per cent of the marketing budget in source markets. “In India, expanded promotional coverage from New Delhi and Mumbai to two new cities, namely Bengaluru and Chennai will be implemented so that all Indian cities connected to Hong Kong by direct flights are covered,” added Puri.
Talking about the air connectivity between the two countries, he added that currently, there are three airlines, namely Cathay Pacific Airways, Dragon Air and Jet Airways direct between Hong Kong from , Mumbai, Bengaluru and Chennai. 2011, Hong Kong’s visitor arrivals crossed over the 41 million mark. “We around 498,063 visitors from India, representing 1.2 per cent of the total arrivals. ahead, foresee a 5.5 per cent growth in general in overall visitor arrival figures to Hong Kong as global economy is exto be sluggish in 2012 which may affect visitor’s interest in outbound travel,” informed Puri.
HKTB also has dedicated trade representative based in New Delhi with offices in Mumbai and some south Indian cities to support the Indian travel trade. It also organises initiatives like specialists training workshops for Indian travel trade and travel missions for buyers-meet-sellers sessions to build product knowledge on the destination.
