The Shilla Duty Free, the travel retail unit of South Korea’s Hotel Shilla Co., announced Monday that the number of Chinese members and website visitors has surged since it began accepting WeChat Pay service, the most popular digital payment platform in China.

The duty free store operator said it saw the number of new members at its online shopping mall in China more than double since it added WeChat Pay in March. The number of logins at the online mall website through WeChat accounts also increased by more than three times, and total payments by Chinese customers via WeChat rose 3.5 times since the launch of the service, the company said.

The retailer said it plans to step up its efforts to attract more Chinese customers by launching services including synchronizing Shilla membership with WeChat Pay. It will also display benefits and rewards provided by Shilla Duty Free at the top of the front page of WeChat’s new service WeChat Pay Overseas Gift Pack.

Chinese shoppers can connect their WeChat accounts to Shilla membership to make payments through a digital wallet’ created in WeChat app. The Shilla Duty Free also offers tailored benefits to the customers.

WeChat is the most popular mobile messaging app in China with more than 1 billion users. Its digital wallet service WeChat Pay has around 900 million monthly active users as of last year. The Shilla Duty Free established a strategic alliance with WeChat Pay in 2016 to boost its Chinese operation through various promotional events and services customized for Chinese shoppers.

By Lee Duk-joo and Choi Mira

[ⓒ Pulse by Maeil Business Newspaper & mk.co.kr, All rights reserved]