ABTM and OAG work together to boost business travel buyer and trade attendance

Asia Business Travel Market (ABTM) has enlisted the support of OAG in a partnership to bring in quality buyers and visitors to its inaugural show slated for 3-5 September 2003, in Shanghai.

Under the partnership, ABTM and OAG will conduct a joint marketing campaign to OAG's growing corporate customer base within China to drive trade visitor attendance. To meet exhibitors' business needs better, OAG will also nominate more than 200 regional business travel buyers to enhance the quality of visitor attendance at ABTM.

"Ensuring the quality of trade visitors is of vital importance to ABTM. It is therefore befitting to engage OAG's business travel expertise and tap on their strong corporate customer base," said ABTM's Event Director, Andrew Lee.

"This will be our second collaboration since PATA Travel Mart 2002 and we are indeed delighted with the excellent synergy between Reed Travel Exhibitions (RTE) and OAG," said Lee.

"The continuing growth of domestic and international business travel, particularly in China, offers tremendous opportunities for travel companies in the Asia Pacific region, and OAG is pleased to be involved with Reed Travel Exhibitions in establishing such a focused tradeshow and conference," said Fred Seow, OAG Vice President Asia Pacific. 

OAG will be the appointed "Official Travel Information Provider" and recognised in all trade visitor and conference communication materials. OAG and ABTM will work on joint direct marketing efforts targeting trade visitor promotion and conference attendance.

The trade visitor promotion targets business travel arrangers, business travellers and travel agencies based in China. The conference drive targets business travel arrangers including company secretaries, PAs, personnel  from procurement, finance, HR of foreign-based organisations based primarily in Shanghai.

On the conference front, OAG will be part of the task force to formulate and develop ABTM's conference agenda. OAG will also be involved in the main plenary discussions, sharing its invaluable knowledge of the business travel dynamics unique to China's marketplace. A scheduled half-day OAG clinic will also offer valuable guidance and tips on ways to improve travel-planning skills, and demonstrate ways to save time and money using OAG's print and electronic planning tools.

Asia Business Travel Market 2003, the exhibition cum conference targeting the business travel segment in China, will be held from 3-5 September at the Grand Hyatt Shanghai. The ABTM 2003 will have 130 booths available and a targeted attendance of 1,800 pre-qualified trade visitors.