Marketing Objectives:
Clearly state your marketing goals.
What did your company strive to achieve using this piece or program?
The ultimate goal of Best Western’s GLo launch was to spread awareness and drive bookings for the new brand. Topline marketing objectives for the campaign include:
- Generate buzz around the exciting new hotel concept, GLo
- Support the Today’s Best Western campaign, which aims to create whitespace between Best Western’s brands
- Target unique and diverse audiences with affinities for different hotel accommodations
- Increase awareness and key differentiators around GLo
- Expand the brand’s loyal customer base by catering to segments of travelers.
- Drive Best Western Rewards signups and educate travelers interested in boutique hotel accommodations on the program’s robust offerings
Target Audience:
Who was/is the target audience?
Characterize the composition, size, and location of your target audience.
The boutique hotel brands are each individual and unique in their requirements and target different segments of travelers such as road warriors, families traveling by car, millennials, modern business travelers, and tech-centric enthusiasts. Key audience segments for GLo include:
• Stylish leisure travelers looking for a modern hotel experience
• Tech-centric travelers in search of boutique hotel experiences and fresh, stylish accommodations
• Road warriors looking for a hotel that allows for work and play
• Modern travelers looking for unique experiences in suburban locations with diverse amenities
• Travelers looking to connect in shared spaces in a modern way.
• Best Western rewards members and Best Western brand loyalists interested finding in a new way to travel within the Best Western family of brands
Research, Planning, and Implementation:
What market research was conducted prior to planning the piece/campaign?
Research shows hotel guests are moving from the traditional hotel experience and looking for more connected and healthier options when on the road. To align with this new road-warrior mentality, Best Western launched GLo to target suburban markets and provide an elevated hotel experience. The website was launched in unison with the brand to highlight GLo’s bold, expressive amenities.
Through engaging content, the website establishes GLo as an innovative brand meant to connect travelers with convenient amenities for life on the go. A property tour video by travel expert, Chet Garner, creates additional momentum around GLo by showing the property’s best features like “smart” guest rooms and communal lobby workspaces.
The site highlights GLo properties that have opened or are opening soon to encourage travelers to plan a trip for an exceptionally bold hospitality experience. Each location has a direct booking link to bestwestern.com, accompanied by images to spark travel inspiration.
Message:
What is the key message intended for the piece/campaign?
What differentiates your piece/campaign in the marketplace?
To highlight the modern brand’s features, Best Western focused on developing messaging points around the main tagline, “Your Stay Just Got Brighter” to showcase GLo as a beacon of light in the sea of mundane, suburban hotel experiences. The use of phrases like “Lighting the Way” allowed Best Western to establish white space between GLo and the other hotel brands in Best Western’s diverse portfolio.
The site focuses on what prospective customers can expect when staying at a GLo property, including smart guest rooms, tech-centric shared spaces and various amenities to stay healthy while on the go. In addition to these amenities, the site highlights the Best Western Rewards (BWR) program which allows guest to have a “Bright and Rewarding” experience. This messaging ties back to Best Western’s overarching theme that guests can have an authentic boutique experience while still having access to all of the great standard features of Best Western.
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 GLo website launch has been a great success, driving booking traffic, educating users about the “Today’s Best Western” campaign and promoting BWR. Since its launch in fall 2018, the GLo website has garnered the following results in unison with the Boutique Brands campaign:
• Users have spent an average of 4 minutes on the site, 2 minutes longer than the market average, signaling the site’s content is engaging and informing consumers
• More than 60,000 views on Chet Garner’s YouTube video, resulting in increased awareness of GLo’s brand offerings
• More than 525,000 combined views on all influencer specific content
• More than 19,000 engagements on social channels
• More than 7% average engagement rate on content.
Entry Title
Best Western Debuts New Brand: Glo