10 July 2007 |  Print |  Email

Strong collaboration between government and private sectors is needed to boost tourism arrivals to Shanghai in 2007 - 2010

10 July 2007 - SINGAPORE (HSMAI ASIA PACIFIC) - The Hospitality Sales & Marketing Association International (HSMAI) Asia Pacific Chapter in partnership with the International Branded Hotels of Shanghai (IBHS) organized a full day conference that took a critical look at key issues facing the hospitality and tourism sectors in Shanghai.

As part of the HSMAI APAC’s conference series for 2007, ASIA CONNECT - Shanghai was presented for the first time in China. Delegates including General Managers, Directors of Marketing & Sales and Human Resource Directors gathered at the Hua Ting Hotel & Towers on 29 June in a bid to address several challenging issues.

The ASIA CONNECT - Shanghai agenda was focused on three key themes

- Managing well in the face of HR & other employee staffing issues
- Keeping your balance in an over supply market
- ‘Destination Branding’ - Creating new demand

In an welcome address by Michael Meade, Senior VP, Sales & Marketing, Jin Jiang Int’l Hotel Management Company Ltd and founding board member of HSMAI Asia Pacific, Meade emphasized that, “HSMAI’s key role is to provide resources to support hospitality sales and marketing professionals at all levels if their career and by hosting Asia Connect in Shanghai together with IBHS, we have created a forum where industry issues can be addressed and opportunities explored.”

The keynote presentation by Robert A. Gilbert , CHME, CHA, President & CEO of HSMAI on ‘Preparing for Your New Competitive Landscape’, Gilbert highlighted on global tourism trends and China’s share in tourism arrivals. Recent statistics gathered from sources including UNWTO and Hotel Benchmark – Smith Travel Research on the market performance of hotels in key Asia Pacific cities seem to indicate that Shanghai was losing out to other designation markets like Tokyo, Kuala Lumpur, Hong Kong, Singapore and Mumbai in terms of the growth in occupancy (OCC) and in average rate (ADR) for the full year 2006 as compared to 2005. According to the HotelBenchmark, even Beijing registered a growth of 10% in ADR, while Shanghai’s ADR was almost unchanged and its OCC declined by 2.7%.

Gilbert offered 10 ways to prepare for what he envisages could be a buyers market just on the horizon and said, “ 1. Build the best team in the market, 2. Know your customer, 3. Perfect your strategic planning process, 4. Key Account Management, 5. Plan by marketing segment, 6. Distribution & Channel Management, 7. Revenue Mangement, 8. Prospecting, 9. Be a leader, 10. Everybody sell – Sales & Marketing is a disapline, not a department.”

Key findings from an industry survey launched in May entitled, ‘What Keeps You Up At Nights?’ was presented by William Hall, GM, Hotel Equatorial Shanghai and Chairman of IBHS. “The purpose of this survey was to gain a better understanding on what the key concerns are for hospitality professionals in Shanghai”, said Hall. He added, “We noted three common themes coming through in the survey response which included ‘manpower challenges’, the ‘changing competitive landscape’ due to Shanghai’s huge increase in new room supply for 2006- 2009 and the need for a ‘creative destination marketing campaign’ to generate new demand and repeat visits to our city.”

Yeoh Siew Hoon , Founder - SHY Ventures and WIRED in Travel (WIT), a guest speaker at Asia Connect shared her thoughts on how lifestyle trends & the new consumer behaviour are reshaping the way hospitality sales & marketing professionals should market to a new breed of customers. Yeoh said, “Our future depends on being wired to the future consumer in every sense of the word – wired to their changing needs and desires and wired to them through all communication channels. We have to think of ways to engage these digital natives who live in virtual worlds, play video games and spend more time on social networking sites like MySpace, YouTube and Facebook than in school halls.

Yeoh also touched on the need be in tune with societal issues and emphasized that savvy marketing professionals could appeal to this cause-sensitive market with the right message and value proposition. She said,” There are some who believe that the climate change issue will also affect the way people travel and how they will choose their destinations and hotels. We need to help our customers make informed choices by being informed ourselves.”

In a panel discussion moderated by Michael Meade, featuring panel members William Hall, GM of Hotel Equatorial Shanghai, Robert Gilbert, President & CEO of HSMAI and John Northen, GM - Renaissance Shanghai Zhongshan Park, the group shared their views on ways to cope in a buyer’s market and ideas on creating new demand for ‘Destination - Shanghai’. “The discussion on Supply & Demand in Shanghai was very timely and drew a lot of attention and interaction with the audience”, said Meade. The salient points coming out this session were, ‘With Shanghai seeing another 45 new international brand hotels opening between 2006 and 2009, while the current pace of demand sits at less than half the rate of supply growth, it’s easy to understand the concern among hotel operators in Shanghai’

The focus of the panel was to explore ways to increase the “pie in Shanghai”. In particular the need for a cooperative approach between the industry and the tourism authorities was seen as essential to increase the leisure and MICE markets. It was also considered a priority for hotels to increase their weekend and “Golden Holiday” leisure business.

Northen said, “We need to be proactive in addressing these issues and think ‘Big Picture’. Shanghai needs to create a persona that captures the essence of a desirable destination. We need to bring ‘Romance’ into the picture.” The audience agreed that the allure of Shanghai was somehow missing and that by bringing back some of the fond memories of ‘Old Shanghai’ could make her shine once again.

The final session of the day entitled, ‘Battle for the Best’ moderated by Christine Toguchi, Managing Director – HSMAI Asia Pacific & MacroVision Network Pte Ltd included panelists Angeli Kwauk, Director of Human Resources - Grand Hyatt Shanghai, Lawrence Lee, Sr. Vice President, Human Resources - Jin Jiang International Hotel Management Co. Ltd., Lucas Peng, Managing Director- IFH Asia Pacific and Andrew Chan, General Manager of TMS Asia Pacific.

HR issues ranked as one of the top challenges faced by those responding to the survey and while some questioned the link between HR and Marketing, it soon became apparent in this discussion that marketing played a key role at various stages from talent acquisition, employee engagement through to retention and development.

Lawrence Lee of Jin Jiang Hotels said, “ I believe strongly in HR Marketing. In HR, there is a constant need to achieve the 3 Cs….Communicate, Connect, Convince. When we are able to do this effectively, we can see better results.”

Agreeing with Lee’s comments, Angeli Kwauk said that the underlying principles of marketing and sales are applicable in HR management and development. Starting out in Sales before moving into a HR role for Angeli, proved to be useful in today’s marketplace.

Lucas Peng of IFH Asia Pacific reflected on when he was first recruited by Hyatt during his early years in the hospitality industry. “Hyatt was regarded as one of the best organizations to join and once on board, I was immersed in the organization’s culture, which involved spending time in all areas of the hotel, not just sales.”

In addressing the concerns over the huge talent crunch and the problems associated with staff retention, the group stressed the need to better understand what motivates and inspires people to want to stay with an organization. Furthermore, there was a need to know more about the new generation of employable people called, ‘Gen Y’. Andrew Chan of TMS Asia Pacific said, “Gen Y people are typically below the age of 30. This generation is not looking for a job and a boss, they want a mentor and a career.” All agreed that employees are like customers, the most valuable ones are the hardest to find and the most difficult to keep.

Moving forward…HSMAI will meet with IBHS to explore the formation of a Shanghai-based HSMAI China chapter to assist in market development and to address the issues raised at Asia Connect – Shanghai.

Special thanks to a dedicated board of directors, marketing partners (IBHS), chapter sponsors, Abacus International Pte Ltd, SynXis, Hospitality Marketing Concepts (HMC), event sponsors, IFH Asia Pacific and TMS Asia Pacific, Asia Connect and other HSMAI initiatives are now available in the Asia Pacific Region. Asia Connect Singapore will be held on Oct. 5 and Asia Connect Macau will be staged at the new Venetian Macau on Oct. 10, 2007.