We’ve been working with Digital Visitor since 2015, and this fourth campaign was our most ambitious to date. While they far outstripped all of the agreed KPIs, what we were struck by is just how favourably the results of the social media activity compares with the more traditional activity.
Social media should clearly play a major role at the heart of any destination’s marketing strategy, and has put us in a good position to achieve our 2020 target.
Japan has truly captured the imagination of tourists the world over. To match this global ambition in the UK market, Digital Visitor launched a multi-channel campaign comprising social media, digital marketing and traditional media buying. From a brand awareness perspective, all aspects of the campaign were highly successful, with Japan’s compelling imagery finding its way onto the pages of the UK’s biggest free newspaper (Metro) and onto the screens of closely targeted audiences up and down the country.
We delivered the project in three key stages to ensure maximum impact.
The project featured a Facebook campaign, tour operator campaign and airline campaign. Importantly, each of the three campaigns was supported by social media advertising, which delivered by far the most cost-effective coverage of the entire project.
Firstly, the main objective of the Facebook campaign was to drive audience growth on social media and capture data from holidaymakers with an interest in visiting Japan. To achieve this, our teams designed and developed a daily-changing ‘hero’ application installed on the Visit Japan Facebook page with a theme of ‘See Japan Differently’.
Secondly, we took advantage of existing relationships with Expedia and Ebookers to create advertising partnerships that enabled us to target the more safety-conscious OTA audiences. The advertising campaign designed from the ground up far outstripped the successes of previous years in conjunction with web click ads on Facebook.
Finally, research conducted in the preliminary campaign period demonstrated that Japan’s primary target audience were most likely to book straight through their chosen airline. Working closely with KLM, TripAdvisor, The Metro and The Evening Standard we delivered Japan extensive UK brand coverage.
Our integrated marketing campaign for Visit Japan far surpassed every KPI, and demonstrated the effectiveness of social media versus traditional media. Our ongoing work with JNTO has built a solid foundation for their tourism growth ambitions.
