Marketing Objectives:
Clearly state your marketing goals.
What did your company strive to achieve using this piece or program?BW Travel Zone refreshed Best Western’s online presence, and made way for new marketing objectives which included: • Develop a comprehensive organic and paid social media plan to accompany the launch of BW Travel Zone • Drive traffic to BW Travel Zone and create engagement and buzz • Revitalize the execution of travel inspiration content to be modern, engaging and directly support the brand’s communication pillars • Focusing priorities on innovation, cultivating loyalty and fostering a vibrant dialogue between Best Western and its guests • Establish the brand as a digital leader and curator of relevant and entertaining travel content • Foster positive brand association with strong storytelling, differentiating Best Western from the competitive set • Position Best Western as an innovator in the digital space and travel industry • Engage key audiences and create new brand loyalists

Target Audience:
Who was/is the target audience?
Characterize the composition, size, and location of your target audience.The social media campaign for BW Travel Zone targeted the following audiences: • Best Western Rewards’ (BWR) more than 30 million members and Best Western brand loyalists • Travelers who are active on social media and curate travel content while engaging in relevant conversations online • Leisure travelers who are the primary decision-makers about travel in their household who are early in the planning process • Millennial travelers seeking inspiration for their next trip • Niche audiences, like family and business travelers, driven to the site to explore influencer content

Research, Planning, and Implementation:
What market research was conducted prior to planning the piece/campaign?Best Western researched travel industry blogs and competitor content platforms to better understand what users and customers would find inspiring and engaging. Visually rich design elements were incorporated across the site, which translated seamlessly to social platforms, where users seek out aspirational travel content. Best Western used previous social performance to plan and execute a successful social media takeover across the brand’s social channels over a span of six weeks. The launch plan included: • A social media takeover including header images, organic posts, promoted posts and social advertising across channels including Facebook, Instagram, Instagram Stories, Twitter and YouTube. • A custom video to educate users on the purpose of the site, shared on brand social media channels as part of the takeover Through ongoing social posts, Best Western drove home the message that BW Travel Zone was the premier new resource for travel planning and inspiration.

Message:
What is the key message intended for the piece/campaign?
What differentiates your piece/campaign in the marketplace?The BW Travel Zone launch campaign announced the launch of BW Travel Zone, creating awareness and driving traffic to the site. It messaged to users that BW Travel Zone was the ultimate hub for current trends in travel, trip inspiration, information around Best Western Rewards perks and more. Social posts not only engaged viewers with stunning, aspirational visuals, but also provided a seamless conduit to take them from social media to the brand’s content hub. Travel planning can be stressful, and the number of online travel resources overwhelming. By driving the user directly to a comprehensive travel hub, Best Western serves to eliminate these struggles for the digital native.

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.

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.BW Travel Zone was introduced to the public through an exciting social media takeover across Best Western’s social channels over a span of 3 months and in that time drove impressive engagement results: • 51 unique and aspirational posts supported the launch across Best Western’s social media platforms. • The campaign resulted in a total reach of 1.7 million. • The takeover resulted in 4.4K total engagements including likes, comments and shares on Facebook and Instagram, and likes, replies and retweets on Twitter. • Traffic from social channels increased 835% compared to YMBT, an enormous improvement. • Other impressive results include a 281% increase in launch to date homepage views over its predecessor YOY. • The new site also saw a 28% increase in users and a 45.5% increase in pageviews YOY.

Research, Planning and Implementation
What research was conducted prior to planning the initiative? Describe the step by step efforts to plan and implement the initiative in a way that would allow others to be able to duplicate your efforts. Were their individuals or teams that offered leadership to ensure effectiveness?

Message and Communication
What were your key messages? How did you differentiate your messages? What was the purpose of the communications? How did you communicate your actions to the target audience? What other stakeholders or media did you approach for assistance?

Results and Impact
What results had the greatest impact on your target audience? What results were directly tied to the HSMAI Foundation Mission? Which of your original goals was achieved? Please comment on the process and the outcomes. What measures were used to determine success? How was the data collected? What is the status of the initiative now – will it continue? Was it effective? Will it be used continuously? Will you help others use the initiative to help the industry meet its needs for exceptional talent? How?

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).

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?

Entry TitleBest Western's Launch of BW Travel Zone

DivisionDigital Marketing

Sub-categoryDigital Campaign

CategorySocial Media Campaign

Classification