Big data lab aims to help meet tourist needs

A new big data lab will help analysts in the travel business track how consumers use all kinds of tourism products.

The lab is a joint effort between a brand-management marketing company under China CYTS Tours, a leading travel service provider, and TalkingData, a mobile data service platform. The lab was launched in Beijing on April 25.

TalkingData has made inroads in the data business for finance, real estate and retails.

The lab is intended for destinations’ integrated marketing and to support tourism innovation and upgrading, according to Lin Yifei, executive vicepresident of TalkingData.

The lab will analyze where tour- ists come from, where they go and demographics.

“All the high research costs and difficult precision marketing caused by huge tourist numbers, complex consumption patterns and very fragmented data are gradually likely to become simple and efficient,” says Lin.

The lab data is also supposed to offer solutions for tourism authorities, investors and enterprises.

“There are a great deal of data, but their sources are often not reliable and data couldn’t be compared against each other,” says Ge Lei, executive general manager of the CYTS company.

Ge is looking to the lab for support in tourism project decisionmaking and financing.

“On one hand, the research find- ings from the lab can help us better understand the status quo and trend of the industry,” Ge says.

On the other hand, the lab would use data to serve tourism marketing, investment and product innovation, he adds.

At the ceremony, a big data report on parent-child tourism was released.

The second-child policy and an increasing number of parents born in the 70s and 80s have made the parent-child tourism market very promising, says Wei Wenwen, a senior consulting manager with TalkingData.

“Parents are increasingly willing to spend more on tourism as part of their children’s education,” Wei says.

The report found that most customers come from eastern and southern and coastal regions, where the local economies are in better shape.

Most parents are between the ages of 25 and 35, accounting for 60.3 percent of the demographic.

Women account for 73 percent of all parent-child travelers.

Children around 5 or 6 years old record five to 10 trips annually, the most frequent of all, says the report.

Per capita spending maxed at 1,500 yuan (about $220) for children above 10.

Focus of travel varies with age as well. Parents usually take children under 4 on short sightseeing trips to expose them to nature.

Zoos, botanic gardens, ocean parks and do-it-yourself interactive experiences are mostly favored by those with children ages 5 and 6 to satisfy their curiosity. Museums and historical sites are usually included in long-distance trips for older children to increase their knowledge.

Dalian in Liaoning province, Qingdao in Shandong province, Xiamen in Fujian province and Sanya in Hainan province are the most popular four sites for parents and their children, the report says.

While attractions in Beijing such as the Palace Museum and Temple of Heaven most popular with tourists as a whole, parent-child groups tend to prefer lesser known places such as Taoranting Park, Yuandadu Relics Park and Beijing Zoo.

The lab will research travelers on themed tours to get to know their behavior and offer advice for tourism sites, according to Lin.

The analysis will also be offered to scenic spots to help optimize operations.

There are a great deal of data, but their sources are often not reliable and data couldn’t be compared against each other.” Ge Lei, executive general manager of CYTS company