Dear Reader,

A special edition of the TRAVELSAT Competitive Index on Chinese outbound tourism is published online this week thanks to the new strategic partnership between TCI Research and COTRI.

TRAVELSAT Competitive Index is the global independent UNWTO endorsed standard measuring visitor experience quality. More than 1,300 Chinese outbound travellers were interviewed in 2018 and 2019. The visitors post-evaluated the destination via a standard online questionnaire maximum three months after their visit, so to capture satisfaction while it is still “fresh” in their memories. Respondents were screened via combined methods of online panels and local random intercepts at destinations.

The key inside from the survey is that the visitor experience and reputation impact the decision on the destination much more than an advertisement. 49% of the interviewees said that the reputation as “Must-see” destination was important for their choice and 42% named friends and relatives experiences. Advertising on the other hand influenced only 29%.

The survey also confirmed that the two most important aspects of Chinese visitor’s satisfaction are Locals’ hospitality and Safety. Hygiene was rather at the bottom of the list of important aspects. That will have certainly changed after China outbound tourism starts again in the coming months.

None of the different items analysed triggered a positive response of “exceptional”, but a number of items could only reach “acceptable”, among them cost to destination, ease of communication, visitors’ centres and guided tours. The highest ratings as “high” level of satisfaction achieved Landscape, Theme parks and Air quality, confirming again the need to increase the quality of man-made products for Chinese visitors to get to levels of satisfaction beyond expectation.

In a BCG matrix, which puts aspects of very high importance and with very high levels of satisfaction in the top right corner, this corner is simply empty.

Please have a look at the full Index presentation, which also includes some information from COTRI above the current situation of Chinese outbound tourism. It is available on the LinkedIn link of Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Georg Arlt.

A video giving further explanations to the slides and featuring a dialogue between Olivier Henry-Biabaud and your humble editor will be published later this week, watch out for it in the COTRI Youtube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/COTRIChineseTourism/featured. Already from today you can find the latest of our CTT 88 Handy Hints there as well.

As always, all the best to our readers from Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Georg Arlt and the COTRI WEEKLY team!

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