It may be increasingly harder to find wild spots in China but the company that made its name by offering travellers access to places that they can’t ordinarily get to on their own using sustainable tourism models is continuing to spread its name through the Web.
Started in 2000 by Mei Zhang (above), a Dali native from Yunnan Province, and whose story reads like a fairy tale, except the happy ending is a scholarship to Harvard, and not a pair of shoes, WildChina is constantly in the news, either winning awards or launching initiatives such as offering travellers carbon offset options, as it recently did in June by teaming up with Climate Action.
Named A-List Top Travel Agent by Travel + Leisure, and selected as one of National Geographic ADVENTURE magazine’s 2009 Best Adventure Travel Companies on Earth, WildChina proves the power of public relations in building up the brand of a company in the international market, well at least the USA, where most of its customers come from.
Its website is rich in content, offering videos, news, recommendations, reviews, photos and the by-now prerequisite social network connections of Flickr, YouTube, Twitter and Facebook.
Google “wild china” and the company dominates the rankings. However with “adventure travel china” or “ecotourism China”, it does not appear on the front page.
But this is what its brand-building work does – get the name out there in the right channels and get people searching it by the name and when they find it, it’s a website that works and is packed with information.
According to Alex Grieves, who works in marketing for Wild China, based in Beijing, about 75 percent of sales for its FIT and private journeys come through the Internet. “In general, a high percentage of our sales come through this route,” he said.
Given that it offers highly customized trips, clients can only inquire through the site which does not offer a booking engine.
Grieves said the company also uses a variety of social media platforms to publicize new trips, news, interviews with experts and travel news.
“We currently employ the following: WildChina blog (short writing pieces), WildChina monthly newsletter (news, promotions, links to online content), Twitter (micro-blogging), Facebook (social networking), Flickr (photo uploads), YouTube (video uploads), and TripAdvisor (travel reviews and advice).
“We do receive a number of leads from these outlets, especially from the newsletter.”
WildChina’s clients are predominantly from the US and increasingly Europe. Grieves said that its FIT clients are generally aged between 40 and 65.
“These clients are wealthier and quite high-end. Clients who book via email through the website are generally on the younger side of this age bracket, whereas older clients prefer using our 1-800 number to discuss itineraries and pricing.”
Lately, the company has seen a slight increase in customers from Asia, largely coming from Singapore, Malaysia, and Hong Kong.
“There has also been an increase in overseas Asians who wish to revisit their ancestral roots. Asian customers are different from Western clients in that they much prefer shopping, traditional sites and cultural tours over rugged adventure trips in very remote areas.”
The Chinese domestic market is one area the company has yet to tap but it’s one it is keen to explore. In an interview with Go Kunming in June, Mei Zhang, said, “Absolutely, we want to get involved in the domestic tourism market as well, but we have to wait a little bit for the demand to build up more. In the meantime, we are speaking at different forums to influence Chinese travelers.”
Grieves told WIT, “The domestic Chinese market really is not aware of us, as we have focused largely on catering to foreigners and other Asian tourists coming to China.
“In addition, because of our higher prices, Chinese people believe they can see main tourist attractions more cheaply – although they do not get the special experiences that we provide our customers. Furthermore, Chinese travelers have very different ideas of tourism. They prefer shopping, eating, and getting a general overview of sites rather than in-depth, off-the-beaten-path tours.
Given the development throughout China, Grieves admits that it is getting more challenging to find “wild” spots in the country.
“However, as a sustainable travel operator, it is our job and goal to find these special places that the ordinary traveler cannot access, and use a sustainable tourism model to responsibly develop the area for off-the-beaten-path tourism.”
It is an incredibly difficult thing to do though given the size of China’s population. In her latest blog, writing about her appointment to the advisory board of TIES (The International Ecotourism Society, Mei Zhang said, “In China, the population press is truly the one unique factor that makes sustainable tourism there more challenging than anywhere else on earth.”
She added, “I find there is a huge gap between the western standards of sustainable tourism standards and Chinese sustainable tourism practices. The Chinese parks being developed to cater to millions is a necessity because of the large population of China. Often, these parks are very well organized to provide such services on a massive scale. However, how to do so sustainably is a question for which I don’t have an answer.
“As the gap between the rich and the poor in China is rapidly widening, I am also interested in making sure Chinese national cultural heritage is shared by all and accessible to all. How to do that is a question for which I want to find an answer.”
