Britain received 339,000 Indian visitors in 2013, and aim to attract 425,000 visits from India by 2016, which will translate into GBP380 million in annual visitor spend, said Shivali Suri, Country Manager, Visit Britain India. To achieve the target, VisitBritian India office has outlined a roadmap which focuses on each and every aspects of tourism promotion.
“Our aim is to identify the high-yield travel segments and tap their potential through B2B engagement and tactical partnerships, reaching out to tier II cities and creating aspiration through Bollywood connections,” she added. The Board is looking at creating a buzz about Britain’s tourism products among family, groups, youth and HNIs. Explaining more about the potential these segments hold, Suri said that Indian family is the largest target segment for international travel as they travel in groups.
“By 2020, India is set to become the world’s youngest country with 64 per cent of its population in the working age group. This is a quickly growing segment of Indian travellers — mostly young and rich, hailing from India’s larger cities — who are decidedly more adventure-seeking. This segment includes the SINKs (Single Income No Kids), DINKS (Double Income No Kids), honeymooners, single women and youth sub-segments and we are focusing on this segment to drive numbers from India,” Suri opined.
Apart from these, VisitBritain is also looking at business and MICE travel from India. “Business and MICE is an important and higher spending segment for us. Britain is India’s second-largest business partner, receiving 50 per cent of Indian direct investment into Europe. We have world-class infrastructure to host large–scale conventions. We are working with Indian MICE operators to position Britain as a MICE destination India,” she said. Speaking on the average spend, she informed that the average holiday visitor in Britain from India spends GBP 504, while the average business visitor spends GBP 1,419.
“London is already established in the Indian market. We are now promoting new tourism products in India to create more interest among Indian travellers,” she said, and added that VisitBritain is expanding its promotional campaign to tier-II cities in India apart from metros.
Suri opined that Indian travel trade is very important for the tourism body. “We are planning to introduce co-op campaigns and tie-ins with partners like the national tourist boards and the Indian travel trade to incentivise sales of Britain packages. We are also encouraging the trade to introduce new itineraries that promote not only London but a “newer”, broader range of regions to consumers. To target the fast-growing FIT segment, we will continue engaging and working with OTAs like Yatra.com, Make My Trip, Ibibo.com and Expedia. To help British destinations and get Britain products to Indian consumers, we will attend SATTE, providing UK suppliers with an opportunity to meet buyers from tier II cities,” she informed.
Speaking about connectivity, she opined that air capacity between Britain and India is good, but direct flights to Britain’s regional airports are limited. London has direct flights from Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Chennai and Hyderabad.
