Western Australia and MTV
Putting Western Australia back on the map
with young travellers
STA Travel and Tourism Western Australia needed to address the 2017 arrival figures that showed Western Australia was falling behind the nation in attracting young travellers. The ambition was to promote a Working Holiday to encourage young UK travellers to work hard and play hard down under. In partnership with Sky Media and MTV, Tourism Western Australia and STA Travel was able to connect with and impact the target market, driving tourism through a social media strategy. The campaign drove visitors and bookings to the region by 11%, truly putting Western Australia back on the map, over and above the Australian market. The campaign took home the gold at the Travel Marketing Awards for branded content.
A quarter of the annual visitors to Australia are 18-30, but they account for nearly half (46%) of all visitor spend, making them an incredibly important audience. Arrival figures in 2017 showed Western Australia (WA) was falling behind the nation in attracting younger travellers, with only 12.8% of visitors heading West (declining rapidly from 18% in 2016). To halt this decline and win a larger share of the youth market, Tourism Western Australia (TWA) and STA Travel turned to Sky Media and MTV. TWA wanted to showcase the adventurous experiences available in Western Australia while visiting on a working holiday visa, to encourage longer-term travel and bookings from those aged 18-30. With a new direct flight path from London to Perth, there was no better time.
Social media is the key place to influence travel plans, leading the inspiration for the campaign. 75% of 18-26 year olds routinely share travel experiences on social media and state travel as their number two spending priority (after bills). Therefore there was no better place to engage with them. As MTV is the undisputed king of youth driven content and relatability amongst younger generations, it was obvious that the partnership needed to be developed through the MTV platform, which would then provide as a trusted credential to underpin the campaign.
Utilising MTV’s renowned notoriety and extensive reach, Western Australia could share the amazing wonders it has to offer through live first hand social vlogs. MTV would handpick three young and exciting individuals to send to Western Australia on a working holiday visa – to work hard and play hard, capturing all that’s on offer across Western Australia. The three ambassadors would check in via social media and create vlogs highlighting the various jobs they were performing and featuring all the fun attractions and activities Western Australia has to offer. With an impressive social media following of over 4 million, MTV UK would then distribute the relatable and captivating content via its social media platforms. The engaging custom content would promote Western Australia as a place to work and travel, all while having fun, creating desire and intent to travel.
MTV hand-picked three UK based influential talents that would hook the attention on 18-24 year olds. The ultimate Travel Squad included Josh Stockdale, Alex Boulton and Lucie Donlan. The three would experience the extraordinary as they embark on a journey to Western Australia on working holiday visas where they would live on a budget while working and exploring their new home.
Josh, Alex and Lucie would track their daily happenings merging Instagram-able adventures with snapshots of real working jobs in bitesize first-person vlogs, the content aimed to engage adventure enthusiast viewers. Distributed across MTV’s social network throughout one month and on the STA Travel website, the 6 bespoke vlogs included unique and up-close animal encounters, surfing sand dunes as well as thumb-stopping experiences and scenic shots providing strong share-ability, engagement and ultimately, conversion.
Utilising MTV’s mass social reach, a Custom Digital Audience Group was built for TWA and its partner STA Travel. MTV tracked individuals who interacted with the bespoke content on the social media platforms (via a view, like or share of the content), to create a custom profile database that would be used to re-target with tailored messages. This addition enabled the brands to turn engagement and attention into real conversion at the click of a button.
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