Universal Beijing Resort — One of the most popular theme park in the world
Beijing Universal Resort opened on 20th September 2021 and is the third in Asia and the sixth theme park for Universal theme park all over the world. Among China’s large theme parks, Beijing Universal Studio Resort generated the highest revenue while tourists had a decrease of 0.33% in 2022.
With the help of Universal Studios’ intellectual property (IP) resources, it has created a rich and varied IP theme park, covering five major IPs which are Harry Potter, Transformers, Kung Fu Panda, Little Yellow Man, and Jurassic World. According to a conservative estimate, it can reach billions of fans of these animation IPs in China.
Social Media
Universal Studios, like many theme parks, have official accounts and post promotional blog posts on online platforms, such as Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, and Weibo (a Chinese social media app). Through these platforms, Beijing Universal Resort can post news and images about the latest events and activities to interact with and attract consumers. In the comments section of the posts, Universal Studios can have a better understanding of the needs of consumers through their messages.
Amidst the different customs and cultures of China, Universal Studios Beijing has uploaded videos about celebrating Chinese New Year on TikTok. They used the Kung Fu Panda character with Chinese characteristics from the Universal Studios characters to create the New Year’s Blessing promotional video. As can be seen in the YouTube video, each cartoon character wore a Chinese traditional costume during an open-air parade in the park. This campaign not only caters to different cultures, but it also increases the brand’s popularity with Chinese tourists and makes them feel respected.
Cooperation
Since Universal Studios was built in Beijing, it had a serious lack of localization and a bottleneck in marketing and promotion. But it suddenly exploded in popularity because of a TikTok video of Megatron, the villainous character from Transformers, interacting with tourists. “Megatron” interacts with tourists using very humorous words in Beijing dialect. The spread of TikTok videos has led to an influx of tourists queuing up to interact with Optimus Prime.
On TikTok in China, a very large number of internet sensations have been invited to visit Universal Studios Beijing to take photos and post related videos, which has led to more and more fans following the trend of visiting Universal Studios, and even having an exclusive Universal Studios background music.
Universal Studios’ consumer group is younger in age, and the large group of people who use the TikTok platform are also mostly young. Universal Studios Beijing cooperates with many internet celebrities, inviting bloggers to take short videos in the park and uploading related blog posts to bring great influence and successful marketing.
Universal Studios is an exclusive amusement park created through film themes, enabling film fans to immerse themselves in real-life scenes and storylines from the films. Although Universal Studios Beijing’s marketing approach lacked innovation, it still understood the needs of the Chinese market and succeeded.
