Destination Marketing - Trip.com Group's Vice President dissects the trends to revive for 'The New Travel'

Trip.com Group, a renowned global travel service provider comprising Ctrip, Trip.com, Skyscanner, and Qunar, has been at the forefront of utilising artificial intelligence and big data to maintain a competitive edge in the industry.

Trip.com Group invested in AI and machine learning several years ago to improve the customer experience by personalising recommendations, implementing customer service chatbots, and offering self-help services. Trip.com Group uses AI and machine learning to enhance businesses' capabilities and increase operating efficiency.

In fact, Trip.com Group launched an industry-first wide-scale adoption of artificial intelligence for customer service. Today, AI technology helps solve over 75% of customer inquiries via AI chatbots. Wow!

In this exclusive interview for Digital Travel Asia, we invited Edison Chen, Vice President, of destination marketing & strategy alliances at Trip.com Group, to tell us the trends he believes will have the biggest impact on ‘the new travel’.

Edison unpacks the modern-day travellers - how they think, act and behave before Trip’s strategy of response. We hear the tech under investigation and the THREE KEY TRENDS Trip.com Group have identified using their immense amount of customer data - not to be missed!

Fiji Airways and Trip.com Group

What trends do you believe will have the biggest impact on ‘the new travel’?

An increasing number of individuals are venturing out into the world again. Surging traveller numbers and how destinations can adapt to their requirements will significantly influence the industry in 2023 and beyond.

Modern travellers have high expectations when it comes to their trips. They want to feel confident in their bookings via strong digital technology and excellent 24/7 customer service, have a broad range of products and sustainable travel options, and enjoy their travels to the fullest via a content marketing ecosystem.

To support all of this,Trip.com Group follows a 'Local Focus, Global Vision' strategy, which involves launching new and exciting travel products and services in each key market and a content marketing strategy that features user-generated content, live streams, and Star Hub, a partner portal that promotes products and increases awareness. To ensure we offer the right product to each consumer, Trip.com Group has established a strong global network in collaboration with our partners in the travel industry.

This network includes 1.2 million international accommodation services, over 480 partner airlines, and more than 30,000 ecosystem partners. Modern-day travellers are highly knowledgeable about digital resources, and watching online content often leads to bookings.

As a result, customers using Trip.com Group's platforms are increasingly involved with the available content. In fact, over a third (35%) of Trip.com app users engaged with Trip Moments - Trip Moments is the home of traveller content on Trip.com, where users engage in a community of travellers passionate about sharing all things travel-related.

In 2022, almost a quarter (22%) were motivated to make a booking within a month of viewing content on Ctrip platform. Travellers now have a greater awareness of sustainable travel options, and Trip.com's CO2 emissions offsetting partnership with CHOOOSE is helping to offset emissions from almost all flights since 2022.

It is encouraging to see that Gen Z and millennials are particularly interested in this initiative. Additionally, Trip.Biz is the first corporate travel platform to provide transparent flight carbon emissions to corporate bookers.

How are technologies and innovations allowing Trip.com to improve the customer experience journey?

Here at Trip.com Group, we have always placed importance on innovation and technology. Chatbots AI supports and ensures that our customer service offerings are quick, effective and efficient. Our AI chatbots solve up to 75% of requests from our hotel and flight products.

During the pandemic, we upgraded this to allow it to automatically identify trending information in real-time based on the most recent Covid policies and frequently asked questions. With this improvement, customers can quickly self-solve over 75% of problems via AI chatbot without the need to speak to a Customer Service agent.

We are also digitalising and responding to consumer change through a diverse content marketing approach, most notably the “Super World Trip” livestream series, which has yielded great results, e.g. the first livestream held in Thailand in January 2023 achieved a gross merchandise value of RMB 40 million, with over 20,000 room nights sold.

Subsequent editions of the “Super World Trip” livestreams are also well-received by our customers in the Chinese mainland. For instance, in Tokyo and Hong Kong, GMV reached RMB 23 million and RMB 30 million, respectively.

On technology and innovation, we launched our TripGen chatbot in February this year. TripGen's chatbot allows users to enter travel-related questions, and receive instant suggestions for pre-trip decisions and in-trip arrangements, from flights and hotels to transportation and tours, making the whole process enjoyable and stress-free. This is currently in four languages: English, Japanese, Korean and traditional Chinese. More developments are along the way and will be introducing enhanced features.

TripGen chatbot

Can you give tell us about your destination marketing strategy and what makes your approach different to your competitors?

Trip.com Group’s Destination Marketing Department provides one-stop integrated marketing services for global destinations. Given our experiences in the travel ecosystem, we are capable of providing one-stop, integrated marketing services for destinations. We seek to empower users decisions at every stage during their journey.

This often starts with engaging them with content regarding their desired destinations to offering comprehensive travel products and services. Destination Marketing covers our and travellers’ needs from the start of the trip to the end. In order to engage and interact with our travellers, we employ multiple channels, from KOLS to social media to livestreaming and more.

Our recently launched 2023 Travel Revival ‘A Plan’ aims to reunite overseas destinations with Chinese travellers and support them in capturing and maximising the pent-up travel demand.

How is Trip.com building stronger partnerships and enhancing collaboration with your global partners?

Trip.com Group has established a strong global network in collaboration with our partners in the travel industry. This network includes 1.2 million international accommodation services, over 480 partner airlines, and more than 30,000 ecosystem partners.

Our platform supports over 30 languages and covers 52 countries and regions, making it accessible to millions of users worldwide. We are proud to serve our users with the support of our esteemed partners.

During the past few years, we deepened long-standing partnerships and forged new collaborations with our customers, business partners, governments, and the media. We are committed to improving data integration and providing better data support and analysis capability for global partners.

In addition, we will strengthen cooperation with local industry players in the destination, and continuously develop and launch innovative products to meet the changing needs of tourists in a post-Covid environment.

MOU with STB

By using data to understand the reality of what is happening, what are the top 3 travel trends you expect to see in the second half of 2023?

For the second half of 2023 and from our insight, we foresee three trends. First, as policies progress and more countries are added to the list of Chinese outbound group travel, more long-haul destinations will be under the spotlight. Domestic travel within China will continue to be popular. For example, as of April 19, bookings for domestic hotels, flights and scenic spot tickets for May Day holiday on the Ctrip platform data surpassed the 2019 level. The top ten cities were Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu, Hangzhou, Guangzhou, Nanjing, Chongqing, Xi'an, Wuhan and Shenzhen.

In addition to this and from our FlightAi market insight platform, more than 80,000 domestic flights were operated during this year's May Day, with the average daily level increasing by around 15% compared to the same period in 2019. People will continue to prefer and opt for more leisurely, slower travel to reconnect and seek new local experiences.

This means that unlike travel during the pandemic, which tends to be shorter, travel will be longer and at a slower pace. Long stays with lower trips will remain to be a trend as opposed to the more traditional sightseeing, allowing for better in-depth trips.

From our latest joint report with WTTC, we found a heightened appetite for sustainable tourism among consumers, with 69% of travellers actively seeking sustainable travel options. Sustainable travel will continue to grab interest as we see interest in retreats and rural tourism.

Trip.com Group Headquarter

What impact has China’s reopening had on the travel sector?

Our May Holiday data shows sharp increases in domestic and international travel consumption. International flights during the holidays recovered to around 40% over the same period in 2019, with searches increasing by more than 60% compared to 2019.

Thailand, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, the United States, Indonesia, Vietnam, Australia, and the United Kingdom were the top 10 most-booked outbound global destinations for the May holiday, with nine out of 10 searches made by Chinese mainland travellers to these destinations surpassing the 2019 level.Many young post-00s travellers were stepping out of the country for the first time in May.

On the Ctrip platform, the popular cross-border destinations for first-time orders by users aged 18 to 23 were Bangkok, Singapore, Seoul, Tokyo and Kuala Lumpur. China’s reopening has sparked an immediate revival, with increased flights and hotel bookings. A boom is being seen in APAC due to shorter-haul trips being more popular with Chinese travellers.

With the Dragon Boat Festival now over in Mainland China, a typically shorter national holiday, we saw individuals born in the post-80s (37%) and post-90s (36%) generations opting popular for short trips to Hong Kong, Bangkok, Macau, Tokyo, and Singapore, with post-80s and post-90s spending an average of RMB 2,981 (415 USD) on hotel bookings.

As longer-haul destinations gain popularity in the near future, the travel industry needs to be prepared with adequate manpower and offer quality services to meet the rising demands of travellers.

How is Trip.com working with global partners and destinations to ensure capacity and safeguard the pent-up travel demand seen from Chinese mainland consumers?

We are not just a travel service provider but bear the responsibility for all stakeholders from start to finish. By leveraging Trip.com Group’s global user network and leading product capacity, global travel destinations can increase their market reach and enhance their quality of services.

• Various destinations are promoted through a range of marketing campaigns utilising Trip.com Group's first-class brands and associated assets Customer Service plays an important role in the booking process.
• Our customer service centres aim to answer all phone calls within 30 seconds.
• 24/7 English and multilingual services are available.
• Today, we have 12 international customer service centres covering 19 service languages, including locations in Edinburgh, Tokyo and Seoul, the Philippines and the Chinese mainland.

Our CS capabilities are also boosted by technologies, especially our AI Chatbots, which offer automated solutions for travellers before passing this on to our customer service agents. Our aim is to offer uninterrupted all-around services for global travellers with not only prompt replies from our customer service team but also prompt real-time travel information.

What do you expect to get out of Digital Travel Asia? And can you give us a sneak peek on what you will be sharing with the audience?

I will share my thoughts on strategies and approaches that Trip.com Group has taken in promoting various destinations through a careful and holistic approach. Trip.com Group is uniquely positioned to offer insights into local and global travel trends and movements.

Digital Travel Asia is an important event for the region as it brings together every player in the digital travel ecosystem and offers a platform for dialogue, connection and networking. People-to-people exchanges are crucial, especially as the world opens up and we are all in the midst of a travel revival.

The event offers a platform where challenges and issues are identified, success stories are celebrated, and everyone is able to gain much insight from one another, which in turn helps to improve the industry that we all love.

Ceremony with MGTO

Edison Chen will be speaking at Digital Travel APAC 2023 on 16th August, 9:10 AM :Opening Keynote: Partnering and promoting destinations' visibility through 'Local Focus, Global Vision' blueprint." Find out more here!