Social media was ideal to reach our targeted Millennials to grow a relationship and see Choice as part of their lives and future travel. GOALS:
1. Create a summer promotion that would capture the imagination of our audience and inspire participation
2. Partner with a social-media "celebrity" with a large, loyal social following that was also a good brand fit
3. Create a steady flow of entertaining content
4. Reach and engage our audience in their native environments
The media strategy distributed video content and user generated contest stories/photos across Tumblr, Twitter, Facebook, Google +, and YouTube.
INSIGHT: Unexpected, "I can't believe that happened" vacation moments make great stories that people love—ideal for a social media campaign. Throughout summer, people came to our campaign 4 hubs to share their crazy, harrowing, hilarious vacation stories for a chance to win a $10,000 trip re-do prize from Choice Hotels. We partnered with YouTube sensations Rhett & Link to create the "VACAY GONE CRAY CRAY" campaign. They chose their favorite vacation misadventure stories, re-enacted them on their "Good Mythical Morning" show, and invited viewers to submit their stories for a chance to win a trip redo. They also created their own song/music video "I'm on Vacation" that helped launch the contest.
Video content was pushed via paid and organic social posts to fuel participation. ENGAGEMENT RESULTS BELOW. A brand study showed us that the campaign was effective. Millennials exposed to the campaign had significant lift in Choice Hotels awareness and consideration vs. those not exposed.
The Rhett & Link #VacayGoneCrayCray campaign phenomenally surpassed our reach, engagement and entry goals with target Millennials 25-35.
Our post-event BRAND STUDY SHOWED SIGNIFICANT LIFTS IN AWARENESS, CONSIDERATION AND KEY BRAND ATTRIBUTES vs. those not exposed, including:
* Helps me feel relaxed
* Helps me make the most of my trip
* Is a good value for the money
* Offers accountability for my stay experience
* Understands what I need in a hotel
ENGAGEMENTS EXCEEDED EXPECTATION:
•Over 186 million paid impressions
•26,800,000+ Total Video Views
•303,000+ YouTube Video Likes, Comments and Shares
•759,000+ visits to the Campaign Hub
•249,000+ total social media engagements across social channels (other than YouTube)
•135,000+ Social Media engagements (e.g. shares, likes, comments) on Choice social channels
•114,000 Social Media engagements on Rhett & Link's social channels
•3,900+ Total Contest Entries
•Rhett & Link's "I'm on Vacation" music video quickly rose to #5 on YouTube "Trending Today" list
•25 blog posts that gained over 10.5+ million impressions
•We held 4 Twitter parties around the theme #VacayGoneCrayCray, generating additional reach and mentions (3,860+ tweets)
