Goals: Clearly state your marketing goals. What did you strive to achieve using this piece or program?
The Hilton Head Island Destination Marketing Organization’s (DMO) social media channels are a true reflection of the island’s charm and sophistication, showcasing a commitment to providing getaways befitting of America’s favorite island®. The DMO works tirelessly to support its partners and increase visitation to the area, and one of the ways it achieves that is through efforts across social media. The DMO’s content pillars work to serve the various businesses and partnerships across the sunny island.
Hilton Head Island is also very committed to the content pillars they’ve identified, and content developed for social should work to fit within one of these five categories: Arts & Culture, Ecotourism, History, Recreation and Wellness. With those in mind, the team must ensure their staying within those key topics, while continuing to create meaningful and engaging content.
In 2023, Hilton Head Island had set aggressive growth goals around its major social media KPIs. As a consistent winner of Conde Nast’s “Best Island in the U.S.”, excellence is the standard on Hilton Head Island, and the DMO wanted to ensure its social media channels performance reflects that. Hilton Head Island’s goals centered around:
Growing key social channels (Facebook, Instagram) raw engagements by at least 10% YoY
Growing engagement rate cross-channel to >3.0%
Growing overall audience by 8,000
With such lofty goals, Hilton Head Island developed an aggressive change to its social content strategy change with a push toward more video.
Results: Which of your original goals did you achieve and how? How did you measure the effectiveness of the piece or campaign? Entrants should provide quantifiable results of their tactics or campaigns. (for example, click through rates or ad equivalency)
Acknowledging that in 2023, short-form video was going to be the driving force in any social media strategy looking to drive mcknowledging that in 2023, short-form video was going to be the driving force in any social media strategy looking to drive major growth in engagements and followers, the team got to work. Placing a heavy emphasis on the creation of video content from owned assets, combined with the sourcing of more video assets through UGC, the results began to speak for themselves early in 2023.
For the reporting period of January 1, 2023 until December 31, 2023, the following was achieved:
Net follower growth across Facebook & Instagram reached 10,219
Engagements across Facebook and Instagram hit 1,935,507 (a 15% YoY increase)
Engagement rate cross-channel rose to 3.1% (a 15% YoY increase)
Having surpassed the goals set for the year, some numbers in particular stood out which directly influenced social KPIs:
Video views reached a colossal 6,756,676 (a 118% YoY increase)
Videos shared across Facebook & Instagram in 2023 reached 284 (an 83% YoY increaseajor growth in engagements and followers, the team got to work. Placing a heavy emphasis on the creation of video content from owned assets, combined with the sourcing of more video assets through UGC, the results began to speak for themselves early in 2023.
For the reporting period of January 1, 2023 until December 31, 2023, the following was achieved:
Net follower growth across Facebook & Instagram reached 10,219
Engagements across Facebook and Instagram hit 1,935,507 (a 15% YoY increase)
Engagement rate cross-channel rose to 3.1% (a 15% YoY increase)
Having surpassed the goals set for the year, some numbers in particular stood out which directly influenced social KPIs:
Video views reached a colossal 6,756,676 (a 118% YoY increase)
Videos shared across Facebook & Instagram in 2023 reached 284 (an 83% YoY increase)
Return on Investment: How much revenue has the piece or campaign generated and how does this compare to your goal? What was the return on investment?
Ultimately, growth across social media is invaluable to a DMO like Hilton Head Island, as all content shared across its channels directly supports partners on the island. Awareness is critical and can be quantitatively measured through follower growth, engagements, and shares. Hilton Head Island’s social channels also work to drive traffic to their website, ultimately hoping to create as many partner click-outs as possible.
In 2023, Hilton Head Island’s social content on Facebook and Instagram drove more than 68.7 million impressions, and so much of that has to do with their commitment to short-form video throughout the year. Furthermore, Hilton Head Island saw a significant chunk of their 435,433 web sessions come directly from their social media efforts, with Facebook alone driving greater than 25,000 sessions. These sessions to the website are critical to not only growing Hilton Head Island’s recognizability as a brand, but also the partners that support the great work they do.
Finally, according to the 2023 Impact of Tourism in HHI on Beaufort County report, the estimated tax revenue growth was almost 23 times that of the marketing spend. The team has identified social as a priority marketing channel within their incredibly successful marketing efforts, and the decision to lean heavily into short form video was a key driver in such a massively successful year for the DMO.
Moving into 2024, Hilton Head Island has continued to keep on top of new and burgeoning content types that will help to continue the success of 2023.
Entry Title
Hilton Head Island Social Media: Winning with Video
Division
Digital - Social Media/Social Networking