The competition invites entrants to submit short videos of their favorite spot in Paris or London, to be in with the chance of winning a luxury Eurostar trip for two people. The launch of the social media campaign comes in response to the recent changes in visa regulations for Chinese visitors to Europe – The national tourism boards estimate that France will attract more than 1 million Chinese travellers in the coming year, whilst the UK will welcome over 250,000 Chinese visitors.

The competition will be live from today until the 3^rd October. Those taking part simply need to upload their 10-second video and tag it on Weibo with a campaign slogan. Ten finalists will be chosen and asked to submit a script for one-minute version of their film, which they will then shoot with the help of a professional film team provided by Eurostar. These clips will be displayed on www.eurostar-stories.com

In November, two overall winners – voted for by Eurostar and Weibo users – will receive a trip for two to London or Paris.

Darren Williams, Head of Sales said:

“We are extremely excited about the continued interest in Eurostar from the Chinese consumer. With support from our agency ChinaContact and our partners in both Europe and China, this campaign will introduce the brand to a new generation of Chinese travellers. For Eurostar, we hope this will create future marketing opportunities on the Chinese market”.

The campaign is open to any registered Sina Weibo users. To enter, shoot a 10 second film with your phone that introduces your favorite spot and upload it on Weibo. Full campaign rules are available on www.eurostar-stories.com

China Edge surveyed the Chinese social media engagement of 102 hotels in London, including 87 five-star and 15 four-star properties. Out of this pool, only six of the properties had registered Sina Weibo accounts, and none had WeChat accounts.

These two social media platforms are China’s largest, with 500 million users and over 400 users, respectively. China’s explosion of social media—Weibo launched less than five years ago, and WeChat has been around just over three years—also comes at a time when more and more Chinese are travelling abroad. There were 97 million outbound China travellers in 2013, and this number is expected to reach 100 million in 2014.

Still, London hoteliers have been slow to engage. Of the six properties with Weibo accounts, two have yet to post any content. Additionally, three of the other hotels repost the same content from all three accounts as opposed to generating original posts. Only one hotel, the May Fair Hotel, posts regularly, and occasionally assesses their competitors’ marketing campaigns. The remaining properties are not active, and do not have obvious Chinese social media posting strategies. The London hotels on Weibo also currently have far fewer followers than most hotel accounts in China—even the most-followed accounts have only around one percent or less of the followers of popular hotels in Beijing or Shanghai.

While Weibo remains China’s most popular social media platform for now, WeChat has caught up quickly and has seen more growth and increasing popularity in the last year. The ability of businesses to sign up for official accounts on this platform has allowed them to connect with a target audience on what started out as a free messaging and private micro blogging service.

Major international hotel chains such as Marriott and Four Seasons have Weibo and WeChat accounts for both the chain and some individual properties in China, but no major hotel group has registered Chinese social media accounts for their individual hotels based in the UK.

The most influential social media marketing tools for Chinese audiences, Weibo and WeChat have yet to be utilised to their full potential by London hoteliers. As a market, London does attract fewer Chinese visitors than cities within Asia or even Western Europe. Still, Britain’s capital does attract a higher percentage of independent travellers that are highly responsive to social media engagement. Reaching them through Weibo and WeChat is a low-cost, fast and effective method that more hotels should be taking advantage of. As the Chinese outbound travel market continues to grow, engagement on social media will no doubt become an increasingly valuable tool and pressing need for hotel properties in London and other major destinations for Chinese travellers.

China Edge is a partnership of China specialist companies providing a holistic marketing solution to luxury retail and hospitality businesses aiming to attract high net worth Chinese clients. ChinaContact is the founding member, joined by China Business Service, Qumin Digital, and Orient Business Consulting.

Melody Booker – 10 September 2013

Chinese luxury shoppers are demonstrating incredible buying power as the personal income continues to grow and RMB appreciates in value. Mainland Chinese are the biggest single group of tax-free shoppers in the world (according to the 2012 research by Global Blue). It is no wonder that an increasing number of luxury brands are looking to increase their brand presence through digital marketing in China, aiming to influence their buying decision before and after they travel overseas.

However, building an effective digital presence in China is not a straightforward task, there are complex and time consuming legislative process to set up a business or even a simple website in China. Many luxury marketers turn to social media as their first point of entry to reach Chinese shoppers. Around 70 % of potential consumers search for luxury brands on the internet at least once a month (Global Reach of China Luxury, a consumer study by KPMG 2013). Setting up your own brand pages on Chinese social media platforms can be a quick and effective way of engaging with Chinese internet users.

There are many resources on how to utilize Chinese social media platforms such as Sina Weibo, WeChat etc. Here we want to gain some practical insights by looking at 6 well-known luxury brands in China: Burberry, Dior, D&G, Gucci, Armani and Louis Vuitton in order to draw out three things we should learn from their social media activity.

 1.              Sina Weibo is the most used and prioritized social platform by these luxury brands

Sina Weibo – although has come under criticism due to a slight decline in the number of users and the fact that it is becoming a commercialized environment. But it is still the most influential social platform for reaching high numbers of wealthy, white-collar and image conscious Chinese consumers.
YouKu is the second most popular and is mainly used for the ease of distributing video content. Then there is WeChat – although it is still new it has already gained remarkable traction with luxury brands as the user base and usage continue to grow rapidly.
Kaixin and RenRen have low to zero usage by the luxury brands studied. Burberry as a market leading luxury brand in China use a wide range of the social platforms (seven of them), and is the one that has a separate Sina Weibo presence dedicated to customer service, which is a trend towards deeper social engagement.

2. Secure an authentic brand identification with a blue V logo on Sina Weibo

China is notorious for its cyber-squatting and it is a major challenge in social media platforms. Brands with established awareness are at risk of having their brand names hijacked on Sina Weibo. Therefore, it is important for brands to be proactive and secure their name as soon as possible. Also, to help users to identify your authenticity, you can apply for a blue V logo to appear on your Sina Weibo brand page. To apply you need to provide a valid business license that incorporates the brand name used on Sina Weibo pages.

If your business is not yet registered in China, you can still apply for a V logo with overseas business documents. It is a good idea to appoint a third party with the relevant experience and Mandarin speaking skills in order to avoid complications and delay.

3. Frequency of posting on Sina Weibo

For a luxury brand it is critical not to bombard users with messages or be seen as too commercialized. According to our finding, 1.5 posts per day is the average frequency for these luxury brands – this is lower than other sectors such FMCG, with more active posting frequency of 3-4 times per day.

To learn more about the most effective social media practices for the luxury sector in China, you can attend the Social Media Breakfast Workshop hosted by China Edge on the 24th of September at Getty Images Gallery in London. For more information contact info@chinaedge.co.uk

Article written by Melody Booker, who has over 11 years digital marketing experience working with blue-chip brands in both London and Shanghai, she is currently the Head of Digital Planning at Qumin, a digital marketing agency which is a partner in China Edge.
China Edge Ltd is a collaboration of sector experts with a wealth of experience in China that brings you the knowledge of how to target, engage and retain wealthy customers from China www.linkedin.com/company/china-edge‎. China Edge hosted a China Luxury Retail & Hospitality Conference in London on 3rd July with 90 luxury brand representatives attending.

This BBC report about a small restaurant in Brighton is a case in point. The owner of the restaurant at first did not understand why more and more Chinese tourists were coming in, becoming noticeably the most frequent customers. When he started asking, the answer was simple and amazing (for social marketers) – a Chinese celebrity chef had visited the restaurant and blogged about it on the micro-blogging site Sina Weibo. With his followers reposting many times, the name and location of the restaurant trended high on searches for restaurants in Brighton on the Chinese search engines. Most young Chinese are highly computer literate and would take time to research online every destination they plan to visit. When they looked for the ‘best restaurants in Brighton’, this particular one consistently came tops.

As proof of how social media in China can directly affect your business, this is a pretty good example.