No one thought that "Erbin" would become the first "new top streamer" in the 2024 New Year's cultural tourism.
During the three-day holiday on New Year's Day in 2024, a cultural tourism boom swept the "Ice City": Harbin received a total of 3.0479 million tourists, with a total tourism income of 5.914 billion yuan, both reaching a historical peak. Compared with Sanya, a popular tourist city in traditional winter, according to media statistics, the report card of "one Harbin" is equivalent to "four Sanya".
Source: Xinhua News Agency
From building a warm post station on the street to releasing hot air balloons on the Songhua River, "Erbin", who is like a warm man, continues to release "pet fans" tricks. From celebrity drainage, bureau chief endorsement to setting up character design, and "high emotional intelligence" memes, the gameplay of "Internet celebrity city" has also been upgraded to the 3.0 era.
Behind the "Hurricane" of Bingcheng Cultural Tourism, there is also the blessing of "Southern Little Golden Bean" from Guangdong. According to statistics, Guangdong, Zhejiang, and Shanghai are the top three sources of ice and snow tourists during the New Year's Day holiday. What is the enlightenment of "Erbin" out of the circle for Guangdong to build cultural tourists? How can the city's "personality" stand up and stand firmly? After "Erbin", who will be the next "new top stream"?
01
Playing memes to create momentum must grasp the "emotional value" of the Internet
"Nickname: Erbin/Northern City, Height: 185cm, Home Address: Ice Castle, Family Background: Musical Family......"
On the second day of the release of the "report card" of cultural tourism on New Year's Day, the "2024 New Year's Day Holiday Travel Consumption Report" released by Tongcheng Travel, a portrait of Harbin based on recent tourist hotspot information was displayed in front of readers. The two-dimensional image of raising reindeer, placing frozen pears, and having fun on the snow ...... "Erbin" attracted countless netizens to watch.
Source: Tongcheng Travel "2024 New Year's Day Holiday Travel Consumption Report"
Since last year, from the barbecue in Zibo to the "village super" in Rongjiang, a boom in cultural tourism IP creation has spread across the country. He Jiaolong, deputy director of the Culture and Tourism Bureau of Xinjiang Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture, rode a horse in the snow, Xie Wei, director of the Hubei Suizhou Culture and Tourism Bureau, made his "debut" in ancient costumes, and Zhao Dongsheng, director of the Culture and Tourism Bureau of Suiping County, Zhumadian, Henan, "incarnated" Sun Wukong...... The directors of culture and tourism bureaus in various places have used short videos to "fight in the ring" to endorse the city.
There are also cities that choose to go off the beaten path. The literal translation of the three words "rock town" in Shijiazhuang was once ridiculed by netizens as "rock town". Surprisingly, in July last year, the local government put the creation of a "rock city" on the agenda.
Source: Internet
Not only that, the official WeChat video account of the Hebei Provincial Department of Culture and Tourism also took the opportunity to launch an alternative promotional film "Shijiazhuang that can't be killed", laughing at itself for this "most non-existent provincial capital city", and also paying tribute to the city's "every Chinese who bravely faces life". "Dare to speak, dare to laugh at yourself and never admit defeat, this is very rock in itself!" commented netizens.
In recent years, with the change of the tide of the times, Zibo, Shijiazhuang, Harbin and other former industrial towns in the north are facing the bottleneck of industrial development. In the seventh national census, Harbin even became the first provincial capital city with a population of less than 10 million and negative growth.
From the old industrial base to the "Internet celebrity city", it is tantamount to a "blast change" of "urban personality". From building a "warm station" on the street to cutting frozen pears on a plate, Harbin began to create an urban character of "pet pink and warm men". Xiong Xiaojie, chairman and chief consultant of Times Cultural Tourism Marketing Strategy Agency, noticed that putting down one's body, telling good jokes, and grasping the "small emotions" of contemporary young people is often the key to getting out of the circle of "Internet celebrity cities".
Source: Xinhua News Agency
"These successful cases all start from small incisions, combined with their own resource advantages, so as to release the 'emotional value' of the network. Xiong Xiaojie took "entering Zibo to catch up with the barbecue" as an example, the Zibo Municipal Government arranged for college students to taste the barbecue's kindness to warm people's hearts, and the "village super" in Rongjiang also met the enthusiasm and expectations of countless Chinese people for football, and Harbin triggered the discussion of cultural differences such as frozen pear plating and tofu brain with sugar, which poked the hearts of countless netizens from the north and south.
Compared with the "predecessors", "Erbin" also played the urban character to a new height: the tall Northeast boy and the "southern little potato" just formed the "cutest height difference".
"The visualization of the city will become normal in the future. Many cities are establishing their own persona, and at the same time, they also need to create a highly recognizable landscape to make this kind of 'persona' more deeply rooted in the hearts of the people. Zeng Yiguo, a professor at the School of Journalism and Communication at Jinan University, said.
02
With "high emotional intelligence" to catch the "splashing traffic"
The urban character of "Erbin" has been built in full swing, however, the "start" of Harbin's cultural tourism this winter is actually not smooth.
Back to more than half a month ago, Harbin Ice and Snow World encountered trouble on the opening day of the park on December 18 last year: less than 3 hours after the opening of the park, the number of reservations reached 40,000. Due to the fact that the number of visitors to the park far exceeded the carrying capacity of the amusement park, many tourists were forced to "punish the station" outdoors and asked for a refund, and the ice and snow world immediately rushed to the hot search.
On the same day, the Ice and Snow World happily refunded the tourists, and the director of the Harbin Bureau of Culture and Tourism personally entered the park to supervise, rectify it in a timely manner, and issued a sincere apology letter. Subsequently, from the official "warm station", the free brown sugar water distributed by the merchants, to the spontaneous "love team" of the citizens, the sincerity of "customer first, customer respect, customer as friend, customer as parent" quickly filled the goodwill value of tourists.
Source: Xinhua News Agency
"The maintenance of a city's cultural business card requires the cooperation of the government and the private sector to jointly create and protect a good consumption environment in order to promote the benign and sustainable development of the cultural and tourism industry. Zheng Xiaojun, an associate professor at the School of Journalism and Communication at Jinan University, said.
The crisis public relations of "high emotional intelligence" allowed "Erbin" to catch the "pouring wealth". "The image of a city is often not very clear from the beginning, and it needs to be constantly adjusted according to the changing online sentiment and consumer demand. In Xiong Xiaojie's view, to build a city's image, "the key is to work with consumers with sincere service."
Together with "Erbin", there is also "Southern Little Potato". This nickname, which was originally used to describe a southern tourist who "wears a light-colored down jacket and a cute hat", made some netizens feel a little "offended".
Although the "Southern Little Potato" has aroused the question of "excessive play", the "stalk" of the Guangxi Department of Culture and Tourism has come in a down-to-earth manner. A few days ago, a group of Guangxi children who "bravely entered Harbin" for a study tour were also nicknamed "small sugar oranges" by netizens because they were uniformly wearing orange clothes.
Source: Internet
The Guangxi Department of Culture and Tourism, which is actively creating a "fruit freedom" character for Guangxi, immediately distributed a video of "Guangxi Old Table" cutting sugar oranges, and invited northern netizens to come to Guangxi to "show off oranges". The local media also arranged a live broadcast of the whole process, and organized the loading of mandarin oranges and sugar oranges to send to friends in Northeast China.
From this point of view, "playing with memes" cultural tourism marketing also requires "high emotional intelligence". Zheng Xiaojun pointed out that in the context of the Internet, "Internet celebrity cities" not only need to select unique cultural symbols and city labels, but also make full use of the aggregation and fission power of social media to carry out emotional links and produce good foreshadowing effects. Only by looking at hot stalks with a more open and inclusive attitude can urban cultural tourism be able to catch the "splashing traffic".
03
立住“人设”更须修炼“内功”
"Splashing traffic" is always sudden, but it takes a long time to build the brand of urban cultural tourism. Behind any popular "Internet celebrity city", it has actually refined its own unique cultural "internal strength".
"The popularity of this winter is not accidental, Harbin has been preparing for a year. As He Jing, director of the Heilongjiang Provincial Department of Culture and Tourism, said, since January last year, Harbin has carried out two "100-day actions" for summer summer tourism and winter ice and snow tourism. As the city IP of Harbin, the "truant penguins" who check in and take photos everywhere have become a scenery for countless tourists.
Source: Xinhua News Agency
"Harbin understands romance!" This winter, more and more "treasure skills" in the city have also been opened up by attentive tourists: on the music balcony of Madeir, the violin performance in the snow attracts Chinese and foreign tourists to stop and watch, and the holding of a series of activities such as "music window show" and "music poetry and song party" also adds a romantic background to the ice and snow city.
As early as 2010, Harbin became the sixth city in the world and the only city in Asia to be awarded the title of "City of Music" by the United Nations. Harbin is also home to the "China Harbin Summer Concert", the longest and most held music event in China.
Since last year, Harbin has designated August 6 as "Harbin Music Day" every year, becoming the first provincial capital city in mainland China to set up a legal holiday for music.
After 25 years of continuous operation, the Ice and Snow World, which is only open for two months every year, has become a cultural tourism business card that attracts huge traffic, leveraging many industries such as hotels, catering, bathing, and skiing. Now, with the success of the Beijing Winter Olympics and the 9th Asian Winter Games will be staged in Harbin, the dividend of "300 million people on ice and snow" has begun to favor this city.
Source: Xinhua News Agency
In Zeng Yiguo's view, the display of the local unique lifestyle is the best way to create a "city personality": "In fact, Guangdong also has long-term and stable cultural IPs, such as lion dance, dragon boats and Cantonese songs, which are all very popular topics on the Internet. We need to make these elements more participatory, so that tourists no longer stay at the level of 'spectators', in order to transform them into the attraction of cultural tourism brands." ”
During the New Year's Day holiday, Shenzhen, located in the Greater Bay Area, also ushered in a good start for Hong Kong people to "go north" for consumption. Some people in the industry believe that Guangdong's "personality" should be based on the traditional impression of "low-key and pragmatic", and explore its own cultural tourism potential at a deeper level: "Just like the hospitality of Zibo and Harbin, the mature service of Guangdong people who are both thoughtful and meticulous and have a sense of proportion is also a scarce 'personality' that contemporary cultural tourism needs." ”
【Writing】Southern + reporter Yang Yi Wang Hanqi
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【Authors】 Yang Yi, Wang Hanqi
[Source] Southern Press Media Group Southern + client