Q4 2023 Xiaohongshu Rankings Report

Dragon Trail International’s first Xiaohongshu Rankings Report tracks and analyzes performance for national tourism organizations (NTOs), destination marketing organizations (DMOs), airlines, cruise lines, museums & attractions, and hotels. The annual Xiaohongshu report builds industry benchmarks and uncovers best practices in digital marketing in the travel sector.

The Big Numbers

Attraction accounts generated the highest total engagements and boasted the largest follower bases. DMO accounts emerged as the most active and had the highest engagement rate, although this was heavily influenced by two specific DMO accounts. Cruises, on the other hand, posted much less frequently compared to the other five categories, yet this did not significantly impact their engagement rate.

Upon examining the average engagements for each category, we identified 22 accounts with above-average numbers.

NTOs demonstrated an average engagement of 2,369, with seven top-performing accounts including Visit Sweden and Tourism Australia. DMOs closely followed with an average engagement of 3,739, led by accounts like Discover Hong Kong and Tourism Victoria & Melbourne. Airlines engaged with an average of 1,658, with top performers including Hong Kong Airlines and Air New Zealand. Cruises boasted the highest engagement at 4,936, with MSC Cruises and Royal Caribbean International leading the pack. Attractions & Museums showcased significant engagement with an average of 9,485, primarily driven by Hong Kong Disneyland Resort. Hotels rounded off the list with an average engagement of 1,358, featuring top accounts like Marina Bay Sands Singapore and Hilton Hotels & Resorts.

NTOs

In the NTO category, Visit Sweden ranked first in total engagements for national tourism boards for the year, followed by Tourism Australia and Swiss National Tourist Office. Visit Sweden had 30% more total engagements than the number two account for this quarter and a much higher weekly engagement rate, 12.04% compared to 1.56%. Its posting frequency is also much lower compared to most other accounts in the category.

Tourism Australia is the only organization that made it to the top 10 of the ranking that is not in Europe or Asia. Some of its popular content includes pretty scenic photographs, tourist recommendations to various attractions, and celebrations guides.

DMOs

In Q3 2023, the competition for the top DMO account on Xiaohongshu was primarily between Hong Kong and Macau, accounting for 64% of total engagements. Hong Kong adopted a varied approach to attract views and engagements—mixing neighborhood guides with celebrity endorsements, dining recommendations, and upcoming events and activities. The top two DMO posts with the highest engagement rates were posted between December 15-17 by Hong Kong, announcing the annual Hong Kong New Year’s Eve countdown firework musical display taking place across Victoria Harbour. The post also provided a list of recommended viewing locations and transportation guide.

Hong Kong’s Xiaohongshu posts about its fireworks show  

Similarly, Macau was successful in running dining recommendation guides and city walk routes. The organization’s most popular post is a city walk route guide in Coloane Village. The guide includes a mixture of restaurant recommendations and photogenic scenery, allowing travelers to shift from relentless hustling towards a “chillaxed” lifestyle. Notably, Macao launched its third iconic Macao Week in Xiamen from 26 October, which was promoted through a blend of event highlights such as the mega roadshow, presentation seminar, and online promotion through various social media channels. The event garnered 792.6k page views for the hashtag #MacaoWeek (#澳门周) on Xiaohongshu.

Airlines

On Xiaohongshu, airlines received the least views out of any category. Compared to WeChat, airline accounts posted less information about resumed routes, weather updates, and flight routes. However, content with higher engagement was mostly generated by discounted flight tickets, recruitment notices, holiday wishes, and references to trending topics. One post that stood out as the second most popular post in the airline category was by Air New Zealand, which announced the Conservation Dogs Program and its mission to explore endangered species in various corners of New Zealand with the help of conservation dogs. This post received a total of 2,856 likes and 396 collects.

Cruise Lines

There were only four active cruise line accounts in Q4 2023. Engagement rates for this category are the lowest compared to any other categories. One reason for this could be that cruise lines mainly post about their ships and facilities on the ships, as well as some guides on what to do aboard, but not so many lucky draws and “zero-fare” promotions as airlines. Royal Caribbean International benefited greatly from inviting a KOL, @东京小宇, to share his experiences around the topic of “what I eat a day on Spectrum of the Seas.” Another post that stood out in this quarter is MSC’s video promotion of its Europe route, which passes Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, and the UK.

Xiaohongshu posts by Royal Caribbean International, MSC Cruises, and Viking Cruises

Attractions & Museums

Similar to WeChat, Hong Kong Disneyland Resort generated the majority of the engagements in this category, accounting for 75.8% of total engagements. Hong Kong Disneyland posted nearly four times as much as any of the other accounts tracked, and the top 10 most popular posts of the quarter all came from Hong Kong Disneyland. Hong Kong Disneyland’s top posts included information about the newly-opened ‘Frozen World’, holiday celebrations, ‘Duffy and Friends’ winter collections, and downloadable phone wallpapers.

Attractions on Xiaohongshu rely less on celebrity and KOLs to drive up engagement; rather, they mostly post about artwork, holiday-themed events and celebrations, anniversaries, and gifts and souvenirs. Most of the top posts for museums were about exhibitions, artworks, artists, and opening and closing announcements.

Notably, the top three accounts in the attractions category are all based in Hong Kong, which are easily accessed from the Chinese mainland, thus have greater mass-market appeal than museums and attractions that are in long-haul destinations.

Hotels

For hotels, Marina Bay Sands Singapore led the Xiaohongshu Rankings in Q4 2023, with 22,424 engagements, accounting for 66% of total engagements. Other top-ranking hotel accounts include Hilton, Marriott Bonvoy, Mandarin Oriental, and Preferred Hotels. Hotels posted a variety of content, including celebrity promotions, information about pop-up coffee shops, holiday offers, and giveaways.

Marina Bay Sands Singapore was particularly effective in celebrity marketing, and its partnership with Miracle Coffee and singer JJ Lin was successful in driving engagement. For instance, the most popular post in the hotels category is about actor Xiaozhan’s appearance at Ralph Lauren Fragrances pop-up at Marina Bay Sands Singapore, and other content related to Xiaozhan were also very popular on Xiaohongshu. Marina Bay Sands Singapore also regularly posted updates on Miracle Coffee’s ‘Miracle Tour’ in different stops in mainland China, such as Shanghai, Wuhan, Nanning, etc. The hashtag #roadtomiraclecoffee received a total of 921.9k views on Xiaohongshu. Other than celebrity content, giveaways and information on special offers also often received high engagements.

Marina Bay Sands Singapore’s promotional posts featuring Xiao Zhan