Marketing Objectives:
Clearly state your marketing goals.
What did your company strive to achieve using this piece or program?

Target Audience:
Who was/is the target audience?
Characterize the composition, size, and location of your target audience.The campaign continues to leverage The Weather Company’s exclusive LocationFX first party data, which collects and interprets data on users’ real-world behaviors including location, preferences, consumption habits and future activities. Best Western utilized this data to target its Watson Ads to the right person at the right time to maximize effectiveness. Target audiences for the campaign include: - Digitally savvy millennials who are dialed in to the latest technology trends - Users who have stayed at one of Best Western’s competitor hotels in the past year - In-market road trippers and travelers who show a pattern of location indicating they are not in their home cities and are on a travel journey - Leisure travelers who show digital behaviors that they are searching for weather outside of their home market - Business travelers who travel frequently, as The Weather Company reaches 5.77 million business travelers per month

Research, Planning, and Implementation:
What market research was conducted prior to planning the piece/campaign?Research shows that AI deepens and enhances user engagement for brands that adopt it. Best Western continues to lead the hospitality industry in implementing the technology as part of its overarching marketing strategy. Building on the partnership in 2019, these AI ads entered the market with unparalleled understanding of the travel category and were strategically served across IBM’s Weather Channel app and weather.com. They also incorporated extended engagements like promotional offers and loyalty program benefits. These ads take personalized content to the next level. The ads can understand, reason, learn and interact with users in a human-like way. Trained on questions unique to Best Western, Watson Ads can translate user intent and respond accurately with personalized, brand-safe answers. Served alongside extended engagements, the ads seamlessly drove conversations based on the users’ needs offering unprecedented levels of personalization.

Message:
What is the key message intended for the piece/campaign?
What differentiates your piece/campaign in the marketplace?Best Western is focused on integrating innovative media strategies that push the boundaries of industry norms and set new standards in fulfilling unarticulated or existing market needs. Best Western’s IBM Watson Ads continue to communicate the brand’s unwavering commitment to today’s modern travelers and meeting their needs. The ads continue to outperform those of competitors by uniquely communicating with users on an individual level, delivering personalized information based on the users’ wants and needs. Depending on the user’s interests, the ads respond with entirely different, on-brand messaging with topics ranging from destinations to activities to promotional offers to loyalty benefits and more. To drive conversions, the ads provide multiple options to click through to bestwestern.com to receive the lowest rates when booking. With this campaign, Best Western positions itself as an industry leader in adopting technological advancements to improve the guest experience.

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.As part of the brand’s loyalty strategy, the spring promotion supported Best Western Rewards 49% contribution of brand revenue fiscal year to date in 2019. These results demonstrate that the brand’s spring campaign helped to improve the brand’s overall bottom line while also attracting loyal customers. 2019’s results show the brand’s risk-reward strategy continues to deliver valuable return in engaging prospective guests. Campaign-to-date results include: - Best Western's FY19 Watson Ad experience delivered over 27M impressions, 8.1K user inputs (number of dialogue inputs with Watson), and 1,875 BW branded 1-on-1 conversations across the Weather Chanel and top travel sites - Total # of user inputs per conversation is highest IBM has ever seen with Watson: o Users are initiating ~24 actions (prompt-button clicks, or chat-inputs) per conversation, indicating users are having meaningful interactions o In-Ad video experience driving completion rate 130% above Watson benchmark

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 IBM Watson Campaign

DivisionAdvertising

Sub-categoryAdvertising Innovation

CategoryAdvertising Innovation

Classification