Tourism Board urged to review marketing plan
The Tourism Board has been urged to review its marketing strategies, with the Director of Audit doubting the effectiveness of a number of heavily subsidised events that failed to live up to expectations.
The director also criticised the uneven allocation of promotional expenditure, in which average marketing spending in key markets like the mainland was 10 times lower than in less significant western counterparts. The Audit Commission report unveiled yesterday highlighted the effectiveness of three of six annual events - the Hong Kong Shopping Festival, WinterFest and the Lunar New Year night parade, which received funding totalling HK$57.7 million last year.
The board's surveys showed the number of visitors fell short of targets for some of the events.
For the WinterFest alone, which the board said had generated international publicity worth HK$45 million last year, only 1 per cent of visitors said the event was the major reason for their visit. More than 60 per cent said they were not aware of it before arriving in Hong Kong, and 69 per cent - 2 percentage points lower than in 2005, said they wished to revisit the event.
Board chairman James Tien Pei-chun said it was hard to quantify the advantages brought by the events but the board had committed itself to completing a review on the events' strategy by the end of the year.
The board said reviews were being conducted on distribution of marketing resources for promoting Hong Kong in other countries.
However, the commission said the board may want to review its funding criteria, as it spent only HK$3.20 of promotional fees per head on the mainland - a key market comprising 53.8 per cent of all incoming visitors last year. This compares to HK$45.40 on every German visitor, who spent an average of HK$4,600 a night in Hong Kong - about the same as their mainland counterparts.
Germany comprises less than 1 per cent of Hong Kong's tourism market.
The board also decided to set up offices in other secondary markets, including France and Canada, but only representative offices on a smaller scale were established in important markets like the Philippines and Thailand. The board said it had not laid down guidelines for establishing overseas offices as the market situation was always changing, but it would regularly review the situation.
Traveller check
Marketing spending per arrival from selected areas (and those regions' percentage of Hong Kong visitor arrivals), 2006
Mainland HK$3.2 53.8%
US HK$31.6 4.6%
Japan HK$26.7 5.2%
Taiwan HK$9.2 8.6%
UK HK$36.3 2%
Australia HK$23.8 2.2%
Germany HK$45.4 0.8%
France HK$28 0.8%
SOURCE: HONG KONG TOURISM BOARD
