Reunion Island showcased once again at China Outbound Travel & Tourism Market

The China Outbound Travel & Tourism Market (COTTM) was held in Beijing from April 14-16, 2015. An international professional platform in the world of tourism and travel, this B2B event is an opportunity for professionals to showcase their products and services to leading companies in the Chinese and international market. For the second consecutive year, Reunion Island Tourism (IRT) was there as a destination with, for the first time, new local partners at its side.

This show, already well established in the Chinese market, has now become a leading brand and a major event in China’s tourism industry. After a first participation in COTTM in 2014 on a stand of 18 m², this meeting destination was again represented in 2015 over an area of 54 m². The IRT was present along with 9 tourism professionals: airlines Air Austral and Air Mauritius, incoming agencies Horizon Meeting Mille Tours, Anthurium, Azot Tower and Odyssey, the hotel group Lux, and the company Corail Helicopters.

Promotion activities were organized before, during and after the show, including:

– the promotion of a Chinese meeting blog emailing sent via a professional before the opening of the exhibition; and

– the presentation of the destination in the area dedicated to conferences on the show, as well as sending an emailing during the COTTM.

In total, nearly 350 international trade visitors came to the meeting of the Reunion Island delegation there. This show is an important means of communication for Reunion Island in the Chinese territory between developing awareness of the island, dissemination of information on the destination, and building a portfolio of quality business contacts (tour operators, travel agents, and media).

More thoroughly, it was also for Reunion Island professionals:

– networking with these partners;

– developing short- and medium-term sales on the market;

– influencing programming and sales to the meeting destination;

– positioning Reunion Island as a honeymoon destination internationally; and

– identifying the levers to implement.

In order to optimize this movement, three workshops sessions were organized in China:

– Shanghai: April 9, 2015;

– Guangzhou: April 10, 2015; and

– Beijing: April 13, 2015.

Local professionals have welcomed the organization of the three workshops and emphasized the quality of selected guests for the occasion. Each time, 150 tour operators, travel agents and media outlets that responded to the invitation of Reunion. On site, the Chinese Shanghai TV media, Beijing and Guangzhou TV TV, took over the business meetings: Meeting the destination has been publicized through reports shot during the workshops, and through conducting interviews President of the IRT Patrick Serveaux and Vice-President of the IRT Philippe Doki-Thonon, with an average audience of 150 million viewers for each broadcast topic.

Note that a press conference with Chinese tour operator Tuniu was held April 15 in front of a media thirties, to announce the launch of the cooperation between the tour operator and destination Meeting.