Destination marketing is more than just promoting a place; it’s about making potential visitors feel like they’re already part of the story.
Great campaigns are a true art form and capture the imagination and wanderlust of their audience right from the start.
When we think about a standout destination marketing campaign, we picture one influential enough to push your visitors to start planning their visit immediately.
This level of engagement is born from a deep-seated fear of missing out (FOMO) that we craft carefully through our campaigns.
At Threshold 360, we collaborate with premier destinations to boost their marketing strategies using our innovative 360 virtual tours.
In our work, we’ve encountered numerous success stories where destinations achieve remarkable outcomes by getting their messaging, delivery, and presentation just right.
Here are the three goals of any successful campaign:
- Killer tagline: Effective campaigns expand your destination’s renown, both nationally and internationally. They make your destination unforgettable, ensuring it stays top of mind as travelers make their future plans. Strong campaigns have a memorable tagline that’s punchy, simple and encompasses the vibe of their destination.
- Targeted focus on a specific visitor type: Every destination has unique characteristics that appeal to different travelers. The right campaigns understand who they are targeting and know how to position what their destination has to offer to that audience.
- Clear call to action: The ultimate aim of any campaign is to foster conversions. While not every viewer will book a trip right away, each campaign should have a clear landing destination for travelers to leave contact information to nurture them to complete a booking.
Crafting a Compelling Story
What makes your destination unique? Is it the local music, the historic streets, the unbeaten paths? As a destination, it’s your job to paint this picture for the visitor.
When we think about the basics of a good narrative, there is always a hero and the goal they are setting out to accomplish.
How is the visitor a hero in your story? Thinking about your destination, what can they achieve by visiting your destination?
Maybe it’s tapping into their inner explorer. Or revitalizing their senses with the culinary tour of their dreams.
This thinking plays into a strong story and, eventually, the tagline for your campaign. You want something that is quick, easy to understand, and almost immediately resonates with your audience.
One famous tagline most people remember comes from Las Vegas introduced in 2003, “what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas.” This popular tagline made it into movies and shows and quickly became a well-known pop-culture reference.
This slogan worked so well because it painted the potential of what could happen in Las Vegas and played into a desire most people have: to have fun like no one is watching. It also paints the picture of the town’s image of adult freedom.
Source: Pexels
By bringing these stories to the forefront, we create a marketing narrative that not only informs but also connects on an emotional level. Whether it’s a tour through the jazz-filled nights of New Orleans or a walkthrough of the Pocono Mountains’ local crafts, we make it relatable.
If you’re going to create a destination campaign like a pro – it all starts with an epic narrative and even better tagline!
Getting the Right Data About Your Target Audience
Knowing who you’re talking to is the first step in any successful marketing strategy. You can use tools like the Census Bureau or a research platform like MarketResearch.com to start your audience research.
These tools can provide trusted market research and industry insights to better understand the demographics of your audience.
Social media and tools like Google Keyword Planner can also be helpful if you already have an idea of your target audience. These tools can help boost your creative ideas and research what your target audience is also interested in.
For example, you may use TikTok’s search to find top places to visit in your destination. You can see what other users are already discussing and help amplify a campaign by highlighting those popular places.
You can search terms like “[your destination] travel” and see what comes up. We tried this with “coloradotravel” and the first six posts (plus hundreds more) highlighted full-day itineraries, top things to do, and how to experience the perfect Colorado weekend getaway. These were all generated organically by travelers in love with Colorado.
Hashtags can be a powerful marketing tool as you try to get your content in front of the right audience. They can also uncover the search terms and topics people are using to find interesting things about your destination.
Don’t underestimate the value of social media platforms and other marketing tools to help find the right data to narrow in on your target audience.
Using Technology to Drive Conversions
Strong marketing campaigns always have a clear call to action to guide the audience to conversion. For any destination, a booking is the ultimate metric of success.
While marketing campaigns can set out to do a number of things, like raise awareness, generate buzz, and establish credibility – they should ultimately help drive your destination revenue.
The best place to start is to make sure you have a solid website with clear interlinking and links from your social media channels back to your website that make it easy for users to jump from your campaign advertising back to the final landing destination–somewhere they can book a trip.
Your marketing journeys should also be pretty solid so that your users don’t drop off in the process.
For example, if someone enters your website from a landing page and wants to learn more about your destination, what page should they go to next? Does that page have all the information on it so they can make an informed decision about their visit? Do you have pictures or examples, reviews, or any other third-party validation to help them complete their research?
These are all the elements that go into planning a trip or learning about a place that you should consider as you push people from your campaign to conversions.
One of the ways we support our partners in accomplishing this is through 360 interactive tours. We enable visitors to step into local restaurants, tourist attractions, hotels, and more to get a feel of what a destination will be like before they get there.
Using tools like virtual tours is a great way to help people get closer to booking their trip. The key takeaway here is to make sure you have all the information necessary to help visitors plan their trip and take the next step to reach your destination.
Putting it All Together
As you create your next marketing campaign, remember to include the elements mentioned above. Some of the greatest pros in the business practice these tips.
If you’d like to learn more marketing tips and tricks, check out our on-demand webinars for more.