Hawaii: An Asian Attendee's Dream

With its beautiful beaches, high-end hotels, countless activities, stunning scenery and top-shelf shopping, Hawaii is a draw for U.S.-based association meeting planners looking to provide their members with a memorable experience.

Beyond the obvious luxury and amenities that the Hawaiian Islands offer American attendees, its location in the middle of the Pacific Ocean also provides the perfect opportunity for associations that want to expand their international participation to the Asian marketplace.

“It is a dream destination for many people in Asia,” said June Matsumoto, director of international markets for the SMG-managed Hawai`i Convention Center, located in Honolulu.

A few years ago, Matsumoto and her team decided to take advantage of Hawaii's proximity to and cultural identification with Asian countries to help meetings booked at the HCC market directly to Japan, Korea and China through its Global Outreach Program.

“The people in Asia know the amenities are here,” Matsumoto added, “and the Asian culture is here.”

The first organization to use the program was the American Veterinary Medical Assn., which held its annual meeting at the convention center in July 2006.

“We knew (Hawaii) was going to be a huge draw, and we don't usually market to international attendees,” said David Little, AVMA's director of convention and meeting planning, “but we felt it was a great opportunity to use the meeting as a springboard to get more international members.”

Luckily for AVMA, it had a member who lived in Hawaii with connections all over Asia, Little said. Even before the AVMA partnered with the HCC through the Global Outreach Program, he added, Dr. Allen Miyahara had started reaching out to people. “He had a huge amount of contacts,” Little said. “He really became our mouthpiece.”

When Matsumoto approached Little and asked if the HCC could partner with him on the AVMA event, offering assistance in marketing it to Asian attendees, he jumped at the chance. “One of the biggest benefits was the translation of the brochures,” Little said. “Since they are medical-specific, it's pretty expensive and hard to find to make sure it translated appropriately. It was a huge benefit for us.”

The HCC also provided microsites for potential Asian attendees, mini Web sites with information translated into Japanese, Korean and Mandarin, he added.

“(The microsites) help international delegates in their own language to navigate through exhibitor registration or attendee registration,” Matsumoto said. “They are one of the cornerstones of our program.”

Working with the AVMA on their meeting was the “perfect beta test” for the Global Outreach Program, she added.

Even though it was the first time the AVMA had ever taken its 140-year-old-plus meeting to Hawaii, Little said, there was trepidation about the distance and cost – along with a fear it would lose its East Coast attendee base. Nevertheless, he added, the 2006 meeting not only broke previous attendance records, it also drew more than 800 international attendees, 650 more than usual.

“We considered it, at the time, one of our most successful meetings ever,” Little said. “I am fairly certain we wouldn't have (had) anywhere near the number of attendees that we had without the help of June and her group.”

The HCC's Global Outreach Program has evolved to include a partnership with the Hawai`i Tourism Authority, as well as the authority's three satellite offices in Japan, Korea and China.

David Uchiyama, the authority's vice president of tourism marketing, said his group works hand in hand with the convention center to market Hawaii as a destination in Asia.

While luxury is a key component in Hawaii, Uchiyama said, the HTA puts even more focus on the entire destination experience. “The marketing is more of an experience of Hawaii as a whole, and the multicultural backgrounds that flourish here,” he added. “The product speaks for itself.”

Debbie Anagnostelis, the American Pediatric Society's meeting director, who recently held the organization's annual meeting May 3-6 at the HCC, said her group “loved the center, loved the hotels and loved everything about the destination.”

Even so, Anagnostelis said, “There was a bit of skepticism because most people think of it as a leisure site and not enough business.”

To combat those perceptions and increase the attendee base, she added, the association embarked on an aggressive marketing campaign with the motto – “Combining Business and Pleasure” – and broadened its international reach by also enlisting the HCC's Global Outreach Program.

“We wanted to attract colleagues from the Pacific Rim, so we partnered with the Asian Society for Pediatric Research,” Anagnostelis said. “They helped us bridge the barriers and, with an extensive program with the HCC, we specifically marketed to people from Asia.”

Matsumoto was “basically an ambassador to Asia” for the APS, according to Anagnostelis. “She helped us meet the needs of those individuals,” she added. “(The HCC) was masterful in helping us bridge those cultural differences.”

All of the efforts paid off for the society's meeting.

“We had a much greater participation from Asia,” Anagnostelis said. “There was a 20- to 25-percent difference.”

So far, the HCC has worked with five or six meetings through its Global Outreach Program, but Matsumoto said there are plans to partner with many more in the future. “One of the areas we are branching out to is really looking at international conventions that rotate around the world,” she added. “We want to position Hawaii as the bridge and to be able to allow organizations all over the world to really take advantage of the unique aspects of Hawaii. We're part of the U.S., but different.”