TAIWAN External Trade Development Council’s (TAITRA) Meet Taiwan project will continue to invest in marketing communications with industry players to grow the destination’s MICE business in the new year, with international association congresses and corporate incentives being the key segments of focus.
Speaking to TTGmice e-Weekly in an interview, Walter Yeh, TAITRA executive vice president, said Meet Taiwan’s efforts will centre on building an extensive database of rotating congresses for industry players and providing assistance to incentive buyers.
“Data on rotating congresses is crucial for bidding success and we have been analysing ICCA’s database for market intelligence. These information will be shared with PCOs to help them identify events they can bid for and boost their bidding success rate,” said Yeh.
To grow Taiwan’s incentive business, Meet Taiwan will continue to provide support such as the provision of official invites to facilitate travel visa approvals and destination marketing assistance to local city governments.
“Although China is today a big market for Taiwan’s incentive segment, contributing 90 per cent of the 100 incentive groups we welcomed this year, we will continue to court South-east Asian and other North Asian markets such as Malaysia and Japan. We will conduct several familiarisation trips for event houses and end-user clients in these markets,” he added.
According to Yeh, the 100 incentive groups to Taiwan involved almost 40,000 delegates. He aims to attract 150 incentive groups in 2014.
He pointed out that incentive clients are becoming more discerning and requests for unique activities are rising, so Meet Taiwan will have to respond to such needs.
“Taiwan can offer plenty of creative activities and ideas for corporate events, such as surfing and mountain climbing to bond teams. Meet Taiwan will therefore seek to provide such ideas through our future familiarisation trips and roadshows,” he said.
