The Travel Vertical

Weekly stories curated exclusively for digital tourism marketers

Five 2019 Travel Campaigns That Illustrate a Shift to Emotional Storytelling

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For the umpteenth year running, content marketing and storytelling are the number one takeaway cited by attendees at eTourism Summit.

Clearly, Spud Hilton (former longtime travel editor at San Francisco Chronicle and 13-time winner of the Lowell Thomas Award from the Society of American Travel Writers), hit a chord when he presented “Why Quirky Works: Giving Your Content Strategy a Sense of Humor,” including the China Airlines video that was watched nearly nine million times in the first two weeks, according to Leo Burnett Taiwan.

Check out five campaigns that do the job well here:

  • Travel Oregon – “Only Slightly (More) Exaggerated”
  • China Airlines – “What Travel Brings You”
  • Mount Pearl – “The Mount Pearl Anthem”
  • Thomas Cook – “The Man Who Wakes Up in a Different Bed”
  • Faroe Islands – “Closed for Maintenance”

Want more inspiration? The Travel Vertical has covered a few international ones, notably:

What have we missed that you love? (Besides the eTSY Award-winning “Autocomplete -Winnipeg Edition.”)

ChefsFeed is Partnering with Destinations Because… #NomNomNom

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Good food is a travel motivator. Everybody likes to eat it and some make it for a living. Ever wonder what and where chefs like to eat?

ChefsFeed is an app that gives you awesome food recommendations from great chefs in each city.

The platform also enables culinary professionals and the world’s best brands—including destinations—to discover innovative ways to work together.

In the past 24 months, we’ve had the pleasure of collaborating with Austin, D.C., Utah, Tucson, UAE, Belize, Oregon, Portland, Seattle, Santa Barbara and more to tell their unique ‘stories of place’ through a culinary lens.” – ChefsFeed

Delegates at eTourism Summit enjoyed bites and drinks at ChefsFeed HQ, a working kitchen/entertainment space in San Francisco.

They’ve created a landing page to showcase video collaborations with DMOs, like these for Utah and Austin.

Rustic farms, rugged coastlines, rural vineyards or a rooftop pool bar, how might your destination tell its culinary story? Even better, told through the eyes of a chef?

Meantime, eat with your own eyes. Have a look here.

eTSY Award Winners Announced at 2019 eTourism Summit

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Sponsored and Presented by (l to r) Josh Collins, Director of Destination Activation + Marketing at Streetsense and Derek Price, Director Business Development–North America at Expedia Group Media Solutions

SAN FRANCISCO, Oct. 9, 2019—Connect Travel, owners and producers of eTourism Summit, is pleased to announce the winners of the 2nd Annual eTSY Awards. The event took place during the 20th Annual eTourism Summit, the top North American gathering of destination digital marketers in travel and their partner agencies.

Powered by Expedia Group Media Solutions and Streetsense, the eTourism Summit Excellence Awards recognize and celebrate the best of 2018-19 campaigns and programs with awards in a dozen original categories. 

Josh Collins, Jake Steinman, Derek Price

New this year is the top award for “Best Campaign of the Past 20 Years,” presented to Las Vegas Convention & Visitors Authority for “What Happens Here, Stays Here” and an annual “See Tomorrow” award presented to Jake Steinman, Founder and Chairman Emeritus of eTourism Summit.  

The call for entries opened in May 2019 and concluded four months later, garnering strong interest from city, state, county, and regional DMOs and attractions throughout the United States and Canada.

Appreciation goes to a panel of expert judges: Josh Collins, Director, Destination Activation + Marketing, Streetsense; Andrew Dysart, VP of Digital Solutions, Tarsus;  Andrew Hertz, with Dade Media Inc. and Monya Mandich, Global Vice President, Marketing at Expedia Group who considered three key criteria: strategy and objective; creativity; and impact/measurability.

“The eTourism Summit community is comprised of tech-savvy digital marketers who are always looking for innovative ideas that will deliver measurable results for their destinations,” said Monya Mandich, Global Vice President of Marketing, Expedia Group Media Solutions.

Ralph Thompson, Executive Director of Travel + Tourism at Streetsense said, “Because Streetsense thrives in creating brands people love and places people love to be, it’s an honor to partner with the eTSY Awards showcasing the best from the people and places that make the travel and tourism industry so amazing!” 

Many of the awards were evaluated according to size for those with annual marketing budgets under $5 million or over $5 million. “The quality of digital marketing in the travel and tourism industry is impressive. Every category was highly competitive,” said J. William Seccombe, president of Connect Travel. “We applaud everyone submitting for examples of great work and congratulate the winners.

We also salute Bloomington Convention & Visitors Bureau for two decades of perfect attendance at eTourism Summit.”  

Representing the sponsors of the eTourism Summit 2019 eTSY Awards for Excellence were Derek Price, Director of Sales – North America, Expedia Group Media Solutions and Josh Collins, Director – Destination Activation + Marketing, Streetsense. 

Josh Collins, Mike Green (Tourism Winnipeg), Derek Price

Best Destination Website — BeginatBothell.com for Begin at Bothell and Streetsense 

Best Content Marketing Program (small budget) — Frankenmuth and TwoSix Digital for Frankenmuth Spring Shoulder Campaign 

Best Content Marketing Program (large budget) — San Francisco Travel Association for “Why San Francisco is So Delicious”

Best Influencer Marketing Campaign — Oregon’s Mt. Hood Territory for “Travel the Entire Oregon Trail for the 175th Anniversary”

Best Use of Video (small budget) — Economic Development Winnipeg for “Autocomplete – Winnipeg Edition!” 

Best Use of Video (large budget), A three-way tie  — San Francisco Travel Association for “Freedom to Create” Arts Anthem Video; AND Punta Gorda and Englewood Beach Visitor & Convention Bureau and Aqua Marketing & Communications for “Outsiders Welcome” Video Series; AND The Beaches of Fort Myers and Sanibel and MMGY Global

Innovation Award — Conversant and Visit Savannah for how to use one-to-one transactions to measure the complete economic impact of digital ad spend 

Best Campaign of the Past 20 Years — Las Vegas Convention & Visitors Authority for “What Happens Here, Stays Here”

Perfect Attendance — Bloomington Convention & Visitors Bureau for never missing eTourism Summit since 2000

See Tomorrow Award — Jake Steinman, Founder and Chairman Emeritus, eTourism Summit for his ideation and vision

ABOUT CONNECT TRAVEL Connect Travel creates efficient and effective environments to expedite the sales process by connecting tourism professionals with the products, services, people and ideas that allow them to thrive in a rapidly evolving and highly competitive global marketplace. For more information, visit connecttravel.com. 

ABOUT CONNECT Connect is a leader in the meetings, travel and tourism industry. Specializing in destination marketing, the company produces a full suite of digital programs, online and mobile solutions, meeting business and travel magazines, trade shows and consumer events, travel guides for newspapers and leisure magazines and destination information, which is distributed through broadcast and custom programs. More information about the company’s brands and services is available at connectmeetings.com

     

New TripAdvisor Advertising Highlights Things to Do in a Destination (Spoiler: No Owl)

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Ollie the Owl

Will anyone miss this bathrobe-clad TripAdvisor brand ambassador owl with a British/Australian accent? Animated and featured in TV advertising since 2017, Ollie the Owl is absent from the latest ad campaign.

There’s a shift away from hotel rate comparison toward planning for things to do both before travel and in-market. “…Its tilt is toward in-destination experiences and dining, the fastest-growing segment of its business, instead of hotel bookings,” writes Skift.

TripAdvisor ad

About the new ads, TripAdvisor spokesperson Brian Hoyt said, “The campaign’s intent is to help travelers in active planning mode understand how they can utilize the ‘saves’ feature by clicking the red heart icon on business listings with information on where to go, stay or dine.” See the video ad here.

Prototype: TripAdvisor and its current creative agency, The Many, produced “Save Things to Do: California,” being shown this summer on A&E, HGTV, and NBC as a prototype for potential DMO co-branding partnerships. According to Hoyt as reported in Skift, TripAdvisor is searching for a new creative agency to further develop this campaign in 2020. Read more here.

Madden Media: What Just Happened at “Google Marketing Live”

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Innovation is everything. The biggest Google event of the year for marketers, “Google Marketing Live,” took place in San Francisco in May. That’s when new Google products are presented.

Google Marketing Live

Two days of 21 on-stage Google presentations are neatly wrapped up here for you to grab a seat to pick and choose, as though you’d been in the room yourself. Click here to register for on-demand viewing of Google Marketing Live, from ad words to YouTube.

Madden Media at Google Marketing Live

Alternatively, take a short cut and check out this terrific key takeaway summary from Madden Media, a travel- and tourism-led marketing agency and a Google Partner.

Read more in their post, “New Google Products Set to Improve Destination Marketing.”

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Laurie Jo Miller Farr, Editor
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