Indonesia, Ctrip join hands in attracting more Chinese tourists

A Chinese employee leaves the office building of Chinese online travel agency Ctrip in Shanghai, China, March 26, 2014.[Photo/IC]

BALI, Indonesia - Indonesian Tourism Ministry and Ctrip, a leading Chinese online travel service provider, jointly held a digital marketing workshop here on Friday, discussing ways to lure more Chinese tourists.

During the one-day workshop which was organized by PT.YSR Multi Media - Ctrip's exclusive partner in Indonesia, representatives from hotels, shopping malls, and other businesses in tourism industry will focus on how to increase the arrival number of Chinese tourists to Indonesia through digital marketing and how they could enjoy their stay through accommodating their preference and providing Mandarin service such as guides, city-maps, restaurant menus and so on.

"We are hoping that this cooperation will increase the number of Chinese tourists to Indonesia further, because cooperation with Ctrip is not only about awareness and branding but also increasing sales," said Sandy Sanyoto, CEO of PT.YSR Multi Media.

China's online travel market continues to boom, with growing numbers of Chinese booking outbound travel online. Ctrip is the leading player in Chinese online travel service industry.

"The program is also intended to leverage the Ctrip brand and platform to attract new travel suppliers, to expand the hotel supplier network and room inventory, and to enrich air-ticketing as well as other travel product offerings," Ratna Suranti, assistant deputy for international marketing strategy at Indonesian Tourism Ministry, told Xinhua on the sidelines of the meeting.

According to Ratna, cooperation with Ctrip is one of the many ways the Tourism Ministry has taken to realize the target of attracting 2.1 million Chinese tourists this year.

"The workshop alone is expected to draw around 200,000 tourists," said Ratna.

In 2015, there are over 120 million Chinese outbound tourists who spent $104.5 billion. But Indonesia could only attract 1.5 percent market share of the Chinese outbound tourists market, the Indonesian Tourism Ministry said, adding that Indonesia still ranked No.7 and Bali ranked No.8 respectively on the list of top visited countries and cities for Chinese tourists.

The Indonesian government has made multiple efforts to tap into the huge potential of this market as the country expects 20 million foreign tourists by 2019, said Indonesian Tourism Minister Arief Yahya in an exclusive interview with Xinhua previously.

Thanks to the visa-free policy for Chinese tourists, and promotion efforts the Tourism Ministry has made in China, the arrival number of Chinese tourists in Indonesia has been increasing in recent years.