AdNews 2023 Awards – Best Small Budget Media Campaign
THE CONCEPT
Newcastle is a diverse and cultural regional town – with a rich, colourful history. As the second largest city of NSW, it offers everything from nature walks, gorgeous beaches, to a vibrant nightlife. Tourists and locals alike have their pick of exceptional cafes and eateries, and are encouraged to explore the town’s bustling central district, or seek adventure exploring the wider region.
Newcastle’s holiday makers often consider it as a blue collar location, a quaint coal mining town – but it is so much more! Awaken Media was tasked with the mission of changing this long held image, to showcase it as a unique, vibrant and adventurous offbeat destination.
Encouraging increased awareness, inviting new bookings, and driving a marked surge in traffic to the ‘Visit Newcastle’ website were the key outcomes. We would launch a targeted media campaign that would embody Newcastle as a must see destination, a cultural getaway just a short drive from Sydney. Never boring, Newcastle would shine as the next unique holiday location in regional NSW.
Our success would be measured by our media campaign increasing Newcastle’s position as a leisure and cultural destination, along with driving increased visitors to the visitnewcastle.com.au website.
THE STRATEGY
Awaken’s media strategy centred around highlighting and supporting the destination brand platform “Seek Off Beat” that the Visit Newcastle tourism team had established. Promoting Seek Off Beat as a fun, quirky call to action to people. By using strategic targeting to reach out at every touch point of planning their travel journey, we would capture new travellers, increasing awareness of Newcastle as a prime destination, from their initial interest through to booking their new destination.
The media strategy we developed used the Seek Off Beat platform to showcase all that Newcastle has to offer, drawing people to seek out the city. We would capture the adventurous at heart – showing the breathtaking nature reserves, kite-surfing beaches, world famous surf breaks, and mountain ridges for paragliding, all just a click away. Carefully curated content would also draw in those seeking a more eclectic off-the-beaten-track experience.
Promoting art festivals like New Annual which draws in local and visiting tourists, along with the vibrant cafe, restaurant and music culture that makes Newcastle come alive after dark. Putting Newcastle on the map as an immersive collection of culture, art, adventure and history, in a welcoming, regional city, small enough to walk around in and enjoy a slower pace, but large enough to lose yourself in its many experiences.
THE RESULTS
We strategically identified that the target demographic of those most likely to visit, were families and young couples, aged
between 25 to 44, and who resided in adjoining regional hubs, within a driving distance of 4 hours. We had a target of
increasing the number of unique website visitors by 150% when compared to non-campaign periods, and qualifying
these visitors as coming from our key target markets.
To maximise effectiveness, the campaign’s paid media objectives were split between two key approaches – awareness and consideration. In pinpointing ‘Awareness’ we were able to place Newcastle as an inviting destination city, generating and inspiring interest in our target demographics. In driving ‘Consideration’ we drove action, encouraging and prompting unique visitors from within our key target markets, within the 4 hour driving range, to land on the Visit Newcastle website, and within 30 seconds engaging in content presented to them.
Our media mix featured colourful, visually appealing supersized Seek Off Beat imagery placed on 14 buses in key regional areas. These outdoor bus displays were boosted through digital radio, utilising music and podcast streaming over the ARN network, as well as select video buys across YouTube.
To further promote visiting Newcastle as being a short, yet exciting, journey we joined with two trusted and influential lifestyle publications Broadhseet and Pedestrian TV. These publications gave valued recommendations and suggestions on the best places to visit and eat throughout the city. For our campaign strategy surrounding the targeted increase in website traffic, we used Meta and Taboola to run media across, prompting and directing users to specific articles and other content on the Visit Newcastle website blog.
CAMPAIGN OUTCOMES
Awaken Media developed a media campaign that helped influence the public’s perceptions of the City of Newcastle. Rather than an industrial mining town, we revealed it to be a cosmopolitan hub of wonder, heritage and culture. As a result, our strategic campaign and media placements helped the City of Newcastle be awarded the 2023 Top Tourism Town in New South Wales, by Business NSW. An incredible achievement for this previously considered ‘small town.’
Additionally, our strategic media plan saw an increase in website visitors to www.visitnewcastle.com.au by 162% (compared to non-campaign periods), surpassing the campaign goal by another 12%. Awaken Media continues to drive unique website visitors by promoting the upcoming New Annual festival – ensuring consideration and curiosity keeps Newcastle as the new travel destination, just hours from Sydney and surrounds.
THANK YOU