On 28 July 2017, David Feng presented the final talk in a series of talks to PR crew with Chinese national railways. The positioning of the talk was given as the final act, and visibly, the most important act. The hour-long presentation was a refreshing, rewarding talk, going beyond railway regions, and into the world.
Communicating by Rail + Rail Stories
The talk, titled Chinese Railway Stories on Global Social Media (Telling our [China’s] Stories to the World), was both a talk highly related to how to best fit the rail narrative to the benefit of China, and a highly objective, independent look at how the railway message is being communicated elsewhere. To this end, first up was a look at how East and West differ on a number of aspects — with Swiss railways as a prime case study.
Different to Chinese railways, which tendentially place a focus on staff rendering services and state-of-the-art hardware, Swiss Federal Railways in its then-new Welcome Home ad campaign series placed the focus on passengers, and how the railway train acts as a form of home on the go. The epic Swiss railways marketing slogan, “Der Kluge reist im Züge” (Smart travellers go by rail), was also shown to around 300+ strong in the audience.
The rest of Europe, including Britain, were also featured as case studies, including Network Rail in Britain, and SNCF in France. Tools of the trade were then shown, including Twitter, Facebook, and the rest. Finally, David invited everyone, on the display, to the cutting room, showcasing how rail facilities, including the recently expanded Changsha station, could be presented.
The talk was very warmly received. China runs on WeChat; when David left his WeChat QR code on screen, his phone almost exploded with nearly 300 add requests. Cartoons and sketches of David presenting, made by staff whilst listening, were a by-product of the talk itself. David’s proposal of getting Chinese railways onto Facebook and Twitter were realised in late 2021, even in the midst of Zero Covid.
This talk also boosted David’s production of the Next Station: China series of video clips about stations across China.
Quick Facts
- Talk delivered 28 July 2017 local time (UTC+8)
- Beijing, China
- Chinese, approximately 1 hour
- Audience: approximately 300 persons