Marketing Objectives:
Clearly state your marketing goals.
What did your company strive to achieve using this piece or program?Objective 1: Leverage sponsorship of Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade to garner exposure for Homewood Suites by Hilton Objective 2: Drive awareness of the Homewood sponsorship of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade Objective 3: Drive awareness of Lewis the Duck as Homewood’s mascot while growing our social media followers Objective 4: Maximize the sponsorship by driving engagement with consumers before, during and after the Parade

Target Audience:
Who was/is the target audience?
Characterize the composition, size, and location of your target audience.We set out to reach families that watch the Parade every year as a Thanksgiving tradition and Homewood Suites social media followers that may not be planning to tune in to the Parade.

Research, Planning, and Implementation:
What market research was conducted prior to planning the piece/campaign? Describe how you planned and produced the creative asseets with the mobile canvas in mind.Homewood took a multi-platform approach to promoting our float in the famous Macy’s Thanksgiving parade. PopSugar: The team worked with PopSugar to create a video highlighting the Parade called “The Mini Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade You Can Build,” where a skilled Lego builder replicated parade floats out of Legos. Tune In Ads: To encourage viewers to tune into the Parade, we developed social posts highlighting parade details and promoting Lewis the Duck that used Twitter targeting to reach viewers who had watched the previous year’s parade. DuckFace Contest: To drive awareness of Lewis the Duck, we hosted a “Show us your DuckFace” Contest. We asked consumers to post their best duckface with #LewistheDuckEntry and gave the winner 2 free nights at a Homewood. On Float Integration: We partnered with artist Andy Grammer to perform during the parade and promote the brand on social. We sourced behind the scenes content of Andy on the Float, and he took over the Homewood Instagram.

Message:
What is the key message intended for the piece/campaign?
What differentiates your piece/campaign in the marketplace?Pop Sugar Video: Gobble up these Lego skills and tune in to the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade to catch the Homewood Suites Lewis the Duck float. Tune In Ads: Homewood Suites very own Lewis the Duck will be waddling down Fifth Avenue in the Thanksgiving Day parade so don’t forget to tune in. DuckFace Contest: Enter to win two free nights at Homewood Suites by posting your best duckface selfie in the comments below.

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.The 2017 Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade saw over 3.5 million people lined the streets of NYC and was the #1 most watched entertainment telecast since the Academy Awards which took place in February 2017. Total Media Impressions: 25B+ (an increase of 92% over 2016) Widespread Coverage: Every market in the U.S. – all 210 DMAs – covered the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade International Coverage: Hundreds of cities in 43 countries worldwide covered the Parade. The Pop Sugar video “The Thanksgiving Day Parade you can build” drove 164k Video Views and 931 Engagements. The DuckFace contest garnered 1.9MM Video Views and 472 engagements and Homewood Suites gained 700 new Facebook followers – 71% higher than our average weekly acquisition. Our Pop Sugar video and DuckFace contest built excitement for the broadcast, while Andy Grammer’s behind the scenes content and next-day take over posts on Homewood’s Instagram channel performed at an above average engagement rate.

Project Analysis:
Please provide a brief background on the project and your efforts to preserve the destination’s natural, cultural and historic heritage.

Objectives and Goals:
What did organization set out to achieve in undertaking this project?

Creativity and Innovation:
What new and innovative ideas did you incorporate in either your method of outreach or in the implementation of the project that you think could inspire others committed to sustainability in the tourism and travel industry?

Communication:
How did you communicate your actions to the public, the media and other key stakeholders and what was the aim of the message?
How did you generate publicity in order to build awareness of, or support corporate values on your sustainability initiatives.

Results:
How did you measure the effectiveness of your efforts and what direct and tangible results did you achieve?

Leadership:
Please list the individual in a leadership role responsible for the project and how would you characterize their commitment to promoting preservation and sustainability best practices in the travel and tourism industry?

URL #1:https://www.facebook.com/HomewoodSuites/videos/10155914261134710/

URL #2:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=waJUiToPQjA

URL #3:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ISBLso7HTA

DivisionDigital Marketing

Sub-categoryDigital Campaign

CategorySocial Media Campaign

Entry TitleHomewood Suites/All Suites: Macy's Day Parade

Innovation Analysis: Please provide a brief background on the project and why you feel it fits the definition of innovation, what the breakout implications are and how it was an industry disruptor.

Sources of Innovation: Did the innovative project result from chance, from research, from inspiration from outside the industry, or from some other source?

Goals and Objectives: What were the goals of the innovative project, and were they met? Were they tied to a business plan? A larger campaign? Or to get specific result (such as views, shares, influencer engagement, or bookings)? And what obstacles did you encounter in the execution of the project and how did you overcome them?

Classification

Situational AnalysisIn 2017, Homewood Suites took part in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade for the 8th year in a row. The brand wanted to go out big with a multi-channel program leading up to the big day and Lewis the Duck’s (Homewood’s mascot) appearance in the 91st annual Parade. With more than 3.5 million spectators and 50 million viewers nationwide, the parade has become a hallmark event in the Homewood Suites marketing plan and this year’s activation was our most integrated yet. We started early, using social media to drum up excitement throughout the month of November leading up to the parade day. On the day of the parade, we used social to highlight the happenings at the parade and surprised viewers with an on-float performance by Andy Grammer and extended the impact by releasing a behind the scenes look after the parade to capitalize on the excitement and attention.

Research, planning, and implementation:
What market research was conducted prior to planning the piece/campaign?
Describe how you planned and produced the creative assets with the mobile canvas in mind.

Message:
What is the key messages intended for the piece/ campaign?
What differentiates your piece/campaign in the marketplace?
What helped you breakthrough on mobile?

Results:
What original goals did you achieve and how?
How did you measure the effectiveness of the piece or campaign?
Entrants should provide quantifiable metrics tied to real business results (eg brand lift, leads, or bookings generated).

Results:
How did you measure the effectiveness of your efforts and what direct and tangible results did you achieve? Please be as specific as possible and share the full impact of your efforts in CSR. Understandably, maintenance is another major part of CSR. If you have continued to actively and consistently work on your CSR process; please add those actions to your results description.

Leadership:
To keep your CSR efforts thriving, you need momentum and passion, which has to come from the top. Please list the individual in a leadership role responsible for the project and how would you characterize their commitment to promoting corporate social responsibility in the travel and tourism industry?