Tourism Australia makes a splash with bespoke campaigns
Tourism Australia is not only competing with other tourism destinations its also fighting for air amongst a deluge of content vying for people’s attention. CMO Susan Coghill shares how the brand is cutting through.
Tourism Australia’s latest marketing campaign has delivered more than $56m in earned media value in the three weeks since its launch, despite only running in two overseas markets, and is setting a strong growth foundation.
The strong start builds on the pre-launch ad testing which garnered five star ratings from System 1 creative testing, placing it among the top 1 per cent of adverts for effectiveness.
It’s a punchy beginning for the campaign, which is the first for Accenture Song and Droga 5 since winning the account last year, and marks the second chapter of the Come & Say G’Day campaign, which introduced Ruby the CGI kangaroo and reintroduced the tagline from Paul Hogan’s iconic 80s ads.
The first chapter, which launched in October 2022, helped consideration for a holiday in Australia jump 10 per cent in the UK, US and China, while searches for flights to Australia also leapt 22 per cent.
This time around, Ruby has been joined by a host of talent, selected to drive maximum awareness across five key markets: Robert Irwin in the US, Nigella Lawson in the UK, Sara Tendulkar in India, Abareru-Kun in Japan and Yosh Yu in China. Holding it all together is Australian actor Thomas Weatherall supported by the nation’s most photogenic sights and experiences.
The launch of customised country-specific campaigns, which link to an overarching strategic idea, is a gamechanger for the tourism marketing body and marks a shift from creating one global campaign starring one major celebrity ambassador for all markets.
The approach is indicative of the strategic operator pulling the strings. Tourism Australia’s chief marketing officer Susan Coghill is renowned for her love of data and insights and it was her desire to uncover the obstacles stopping visitors choosing Australia that unlocked the change.
“Not many people reject Australia as a destination, but there are people who obviously place other destinations ahead of choosing Australia,” Ms Coghill told The Australian.
“One of the key things (the research revealed) was that the people who choose Australia have more positive associations with Australia. They can mentally make that movie in their brain of seeing themselves on the ground here. So, thinking through how we could help make that happen, we thought talent was one of key levers to help.
“If you are a Japanese traveller, or Chinese or English, seeing a familiar face might help you make that mental movie or that emotional leap to say, ‘I can see myself on that holiday in Australia’.”
This approach was enabled by maintaining the brand’s consistent messaging through Ruby and the tagline as well as the use of other brand codes and assets to build on the previous campaign, said Droga5 chief executive officer Matt Michael.
“We knew we wanted to stick closely to those brand codes, which all the research and findings said were really landing and working to a global audience,” he said. “But finding an interesting, fresh strategic insight that we could bring to that platform was critical. In this case, it’s about the stories that last a lifetime and the memories that you take away and how that’s enabled by the characters of Australia – that’s the real gift of coming to this country.”
The focus on consistency in the campaign signals a break with Tourism Australia’s long-standing approach, which saw the brand feature a new idea and execution every three to five years.
From the infamous Where The Bloody Hell Are You? to Baz Luhrman’s cinematic Walkbout, each major ad campaign was a showstopper but rarely linked to previous campaigns and activity.
The strategic shift aims to drive more earned media value in Tourism Australia’s key markets to help the brand create deeper connections and build more local relevancy.
It’s a move that has been welcomed by tourism operators, with Ms Coghill receiving positive feedback at a recent travel conference.
“Our operators welcome people from many different countries from around the world, and they see the differences and the nuances.
“Some of the best feedback that I’ve had from the industry (about the campaign) is around the cleverness in that market by market approach. (The campaign has) those global codes, but then you’ve got that local talent and it’s the combination of those two things that make this next chapter really powerful, in addition to really great storytelling.”
The storytelling spreads across all media channels with a significant focus on social media. Each market campaign showcases the talent sharing their personal experiences of Australia, which, in the case of Robert Irwin includes some emotional family videos with his iconic father.
Ms Coghill said the brand had a wealth of content to keep the campaign fresh for the next two years. “Our research has shown that we can continue to run assets and we won’t have any loss of engagement or interest or effectiveness.”
Ensuring the content is compelling is a significant part of the challenge as brands fight for a share of the space against the wealth of content bombarding people every day.
“We’re not just competing with other destinations, we are competing with a massive jungle of content and trying to find our way through it and get a little bit of clear air to tell our story to those travellers,” Ms Coghill said.
“If you step back and think about the world of content that we’re competing in, whether it is the individual content people are loading into social platforms, or Netflix or The White Lotus, we are trying to tell an amazing story and it’s an enormous challenge.
“It’s about how we make sure our brand stays top of mind, through consistently new and fresh touch points, so that you’re being noticed not just once, not just twice, but hopefully enough that you are seen to be a part of a larger cultural conversation.”
These “cycles of salience” are reinforced by the approach to brand’s social and tactical activations and partnerships. “We try and stay one step ahead with everything we do, whether it’s the big tent pole campaigns like Come and Say G’Day or whether it is looking at broadcast projects that we might be working on down the line, or how we evolve our use of social media,” Ms Coghill said.
“We’re always thinking about how can we eke out a little more value, a little more impact and drive those marginal gains.
“The most important thing we can do is drive salience for Australia and stay top of mind.”
