Travel companies exploring new options amid pandemic

Virtual tours become popular choices as smart technologies promoted in industry

Travel agencies are exploring new tourism outlets, such as online tourism, to reduce their financial losses caused by novel coronavirus outbreaks while maintaining people's desire for travel, industry insiders said.

The move is not only a result of the sporadic outbreaks, but an attempt to answer the government's call to shape the industry into a smarter one.

In late November, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the National Development and Reform Commission and eight other central departments jointly released a guideline, saying that the nation's tourism attractions rated above 4A should be basically transformed into smarter ones by 2025.

Technologies including 5G, big data and artificial intelligence are encouraged to be applied to the tourism market. Some new marketing models such as online tourism and livestreaming are also supported by the government, according to the guideline.

Qunar, an online travel agency, said that it has cooperated with airlines, theme parks and drone companies to offer livestreaming shows to its users since last year. It said that in April 2020, nearly 10 million of its users joined a livestreaming show to enjoy beautiful views via drones.

"Online sightseeing can immerse people in some of the most essential parts of the attraction, helping them to make a decision whether to pay for an on-site visit or not," said Xu Guangye, a researcher with Qunar's big data center.

"Whether it's short video, a livestreaming show or even 3D animation, video can help people to make a final decision."

Tuniu, another online travel agency, has also tried to promote its tour products through livestreaming, which has proved successful so far.

It said that thanks to livestreaming, sales of tour packages on its platform reached about 20 million yuan ($3.1 million) in just one day.

Xu said both online and on-site tourism are irreplaceable.

"The traveling experience in real life is matchless because the travelers can feel the local customs when they stand there," Xu said. "However, the online part can let people know more information about the destination in advance."

Liu Cai, CEO of Shanghai Joyu Smart Tech, a smart tourism service company, said that online tourism or traveling through livestreaming is an important supplement to on-site traveling, and the online part can help attract people to pay for a real trip.

"It's a very good attempt. But we need to recognize that on-site trips and travel services are the main sources of tourism revenue. Online tourism cannot solve the fundamental problem if the on-site tourism is hit hard," he added.

"The government has paid a lot of attention to developing smart tourism by releasing several key guidelines since last year. However, we cannot only discuss it from a macro-level marketing perspective, but need to take real actions to improve the industry itself."

Liu said that though many provinces and cities are pushing the tourism industry to transform into a digital and smarter one, there are still some local authorities that have not actively embraced the transformation.

"Tourism that involves numerous industries including accommodation, shopping and entertainment is a traditional and vulnerable one that may face a predicament in transforming into a smarter one that relies only on the market, if the government is absent in the transformation," he said.