The NSW Government’s tourism and major events agency Destination NSW is working with Chinese agency Ctrip, who have over 141 million registered users in China, on a promotional campaign to attract visitors to the world’s largest festival of lights, music and ideas, Vivid Sydney.

“This innovative campaign is aimed at the parents of Chinese students studying in Sydney, offering tailored packages to come and see Sydney while Vivid Sydney is on. It will also offer a chance to attend a special ‘Light Exchange’ ceremony during the festival, which involves the exchange of a light between parent and child to symbolise the values of love and hope,” Mr Ayres said.

“Last year over 1.4 million people attended the Vivid Sydney festival, including 9,700 visitors from China who travelled on specific Vivid travel packages. This campaign will help to build on these results, by targeting the growing proportion of travellers who use overseas friends and relatives as a reason for travel.”

The campaign will see the Light Exchange package promoted across Ctrip’s desktop and mobile websites, as well as on their popular travel app. It will also be promoted across Ctrip’s social channels, Chinese search engines and on the recently launched Sydney.cn – a dedicated website hosted in China, to promote Sydney and NSW to local travellers.

“China is the number one inbound market for NSW and I am pleased the Government is continuing to work to attract Chinese visitors to the State. In the year ending September 2014, more than 443,000 Chinese tourists visited NSW and spent over $1.5 billion during their stay, making a huge impact on the local visitor economy,” Mr Ayres added.

Destination NSW Chief Executive Officer Sandra Chipchase said that this is just one example of how the State is being promoted to potential Chinese travellers.

“The recently announced partnership with leading travel wholesaler China Travel International will also see the Vivid Sydney Festival promoted, while a pop-up display in a popular Chengdu Shopping Centre has seen the State’s attractions promoted to over 100,000 Chinese shoppers over the course of last week,” Ms Chipchase said.

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