Marketing Objectives:
Clearly state your marketing goals.
What did your company strive to achieve using this piece or program?
Objective 1: Elevate brand perception by raising awareness of HGI’s food and beverage offerings and superior service
Objective 2: Increase our brand conviction which measures consumers’ willingness to choose HGI when competitors are priced lower
Objective 3: Drive brand recall through a memorable creative device
Target Audience:
Who was/is the target audience?
Characterize the composition, size, and location of your target audience.
We targeted those with the Positively Present mindset: people who are optimists are heart and travel enables them to let go and be present.
We also identified that 72% of people want to simplify their lives, especially in travel (according to Kantar). And when it comes to mid-tier hotels, these travelers have way too many options - and not enough distinct choices. So we wanted to target these people and give them a choice.
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.
In order to drive distinction, we sought out to highlight our upscale amenities like cooked-to-order breakfast, on-trend menu items, a full bar and our customer service, which historically all rank higher than the competition.
We partnered with actress Judy Greer to serve as the proxy for the brand personality to drive brand recall. With her friendly and approachable demeanor, Judy Greer felt like a sophisticated alternative to the old business stereotypes – and helped differentiate us from the rest of the category. Plus she was the perfect person to taste and showcase our more upscale food and beverage offerings.
We created a series of :30s and :15s videos which follow Judy as she experiences what HGI has to offer, while bantering with hotel team members along the way, helping to showcase HGI’s intuitive and friendly service.
Our videos appeared across a blend of national broadcast, online video, OOH video featured in airports and custom high-impact units
Message:
What is the key message intended for the piece/campaign?
What differentiates your piece/campaign in the marketplace?
With cooked-to-order breakfast, on-trend food items and a full bar -- Hilton Garden Inn is on another level.
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.
Objective 1: Elevate brand perception by raising awareness of HGI’s food and beverage offerings and superior service
• Research shows target guests scoring HGI well on primary campaign attributes:
o 83% agree “It made me feel the hotel is sophisticated and up-to-date”
o 89% agree “the ad made me feel the hotel has attentive service”
o 85% agree “the ad made me feel the hotel has extensive F&B”
Objective 2: Increase our brand conviction which measures consumers’ willingness to choose HGI when competitors are priced lower
o Conviction for HGI has been gaining momentum in recent months and is now stronger than any other brand in this comp set.
? Conviction is at 53% compared to 47% average for the comp set
Objective 3: Drive brand recall through a memorable creative device
o Using our spokesperson Judy Greer as our branding device, we were able to shift from significantly below average brand recall to significantly above average brand recall
Entry Title
Hilton Garden Inn: Simply on Another Level Video
Situational Analysis
Hilton Garden Inn is in a crowded category of all reasonably-nice hotels, teased apart by miniscule differences. People aren’t seeing real choice and default to HGI rather than choosing HGI. The team set out to create a plan to change that and shift HGI from a high-performing default into a preferred choice.
In order to do that, we wanted to assess what’s working for the brand and determine what we could leverage in order to drive that “choice”. We always knew our guests rated our food and beverage offerings highly, but as we dug in with broader consumer research, we discovered that people were surprised that we even had food and drink options…and moreover were impressed with the options we had to offer. In fact, just making people aware that we had a restaurant and a bar helped raise perception of the brand overall, and also gave us credit for much more beyond food. To those consumers, HGI instantly felt more modern, sophisticated with a higher-level of service.