Meet Klook ANZ General Manager - 10 Questions with Henry Hooper

Henry Hooper is the General Manager of Klook ANZ. He oversees the domestic strategy for ANZ, which includes both business development and marketing initiatives across all verticals, such as tours, activities, car rental, airport transfers and also accommodation.

Henry’s career has taken him to all corners of the globe! Originally from Melbourne, he has worked in London, Shanghai and Singapore. He also studied Mandarin for 13 years and completed VCE Chinese. Prior to joining Klook, Henry has experience in AdTech and Digital Innovation agencies, making waves in organisations from startups, all the way to NASDAQ and FTSE250 listed businesses. 

With a passion for learning, Henry is dedicated to the professional growth of the team. He believes in hiring and training entry-level graduates, as well as internal promotions. Henry is a strong believer in the power of different perspectives and a big advocate for diversity and inclusion.

We sat down with Henry to go through 10 rapid-fire questions - 

I think that timing is everything. Klook is in the right place at the right time: in terms of the business we’re in, our location in APAC and the experiences space where there is a huge opportunity for disruption and optimization from the customer standpoint. 

It’s much easier to be a good surfer if you can get yourself to the right waves. The same goes for your career progression — it's a lot easier to have an exciting career if you get yourself to a company that has an enormous runway. 

I’ve had 3 jobs in 11 months. In my first role here, I was looking after supply (merchants relationship management) for Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia. Within six months, I moved on to look after the Philippines, Australia and New Zealand. From January this year, I've taken on the role of General Manager, Australia and New Zealand, looking after both supply and demand (Marketing). 

This to me illustrates the excitement of working in a high-growth company. All these roles have been equally exciting, challenging and full of opportunity. So going back to what I mentioned before, it's all about putting yourself in a place that gives you the best chance of success. 

The future of the ANZ market is opportunity everywhere. There is a long runway in any direction you look. One, in terms of geographic expansion within ANZ and beyond: starting with domestic expansion, we added just over 400 activities in 2020 alone. But our purview is Oceania so there are many exciting destinations like Fiji, Vanuatu, Samoa, to name a few when outbound travel resumes. Two, in terms of vertical expansion. In Klook’s more mature markets, we have F&B and stay verticals and we’re doing sophisticated marketing with livestream programs on Klook Live!. Those are things we haven't even touched on yet in ANZ.

We do two things much better than anyone else in Australia: deep technology integration and speed to market. NSW Dine and Discover voucher scheme, for which Klook is an official booking partner, is a great example of this. While there are other companies who've done that now, Klook was first to market and our platform has the best user interface and user experience. What we are building in Australia today is the future of leisure and travel. 

In any relationship, including at work, you have to add more value than you extract. I spend a lot of time thinking what can I give back? And I think that’s learning and development. My goal is to give people skills and tools to be capable, confident and motivated, this, in turn, leads them to a true feeling of empowerment.

I run 6 days a week as I have set aside a goal to run 850 kilometres this year, which I’m tracking slightly behind as I travelled from Singapore to Australia for the Australian Tourism Exchange 2021 conference back in June, where I got to share about how Klook has pivoted throughout the pandemic and have found great success in the Dine & Discover NSW program - we saw over 20,000 bookings! Mentally, I meditate for 15 minutes every morning and that helps me massively.

I believe that there are two types of key changes in the world since the crisis - the first one is cyclical, and these changes would return to as they were before Covid. The other one is structural, and these would not go back to ‘normal’ per se. For example, a structural change would be the working from home norm. I don’t think anyone will be expected to be in the office 100% of the time in the future. On the other hand, travel is definitely a cyclical change and we have full confidence that the demand for travel will return with heightened tenacity.

We have already seen Klook Hong Kong exceed the pre-Covid monthly revenue levels on domestic travel alone. This is really exciting as that means when inbound travel returns, that business will effectively double!

I am currently based in Singapore, but I was born and bred in Australia. I absolutely love Queensland and think it truly is one of the most beautiful places on Earth, especially Port Douglas and Cairns!

I last visited Korea and it was great learning about the culture. I also really enjoyed the cold! Living in Singapore for the past 5 years, it felt great to actually put on a jacket again.

I’d love to visit Sabah in Malaysia. I learned about this destination only when I began at Klook and worked with the Malaysian team. There’s so much to see and do - diving, eco-tours,  rainforests and even Orang Utans.

Keen to join the Klook team?