The Ritz-Carlton leveraged a years-long partnership with world-renowned photographer and global travel social influencer, Trey Ratcliff to launch and execute the 80 Stays Around the World Campaign. Ratcliff took his passions on the road through 10 cities across Europe and four major cities in Japan, leading photo-tours that inspired local participation and garnered global reach.
The tour included photo walks which photography tutorials and participation from Ritz-Carlton properties in each of the cities. It allowed us to reach the networks of the participants, Trey Ratcliff, and The Ritz-Carlton, using an authentic voice to shape new perceptions of the brand among our target audiences.
The objectives of this campaign were multi-faceted. We strove to:
The Ritz-Carlton is committed to creating indelible memories for its guests. 80 Stays around the world aimed to build on this mission by creating an opportunity for its audience to share in those experiences by connecting through social media. Whether participants joined Trey in person, or through immersive social opportunities, our overarching goal was to enable our global audience to connect with and evolve their view of The Ritz-Carlton brand.
Building upon the success of the US-based photo tour, The Ritz-Carlton added two new chapters to its ongoing narrative with this influencer, Trey Ratcliff, first in Europe, and then in Japan. In order to maximize the success of the tour and the results of this partnership, The Ritz-Carlton needed clear strategic direction.
Our message through 80 Stays Around the World was that in the heart of The Ritz-Carlton brand is the commitment to helping our guests create remarkable memories for life. Any brand could say they are committed to creating memories and amazing experiences across the globe, but through this campaign and the partnership, The Ritz-Carlton helped people achieve it.
We displayed this commitment to both the thousands that joined Ratcliff in each of the cities, as well as the hundreds of thousands of consumers who followed along on social and were inspired about the next place they would create their own memories.
We were sharing real-time images on Instagram to expose the tour to Ritz-Carlton guests around the world who couldn't be on the tour in person.
Our strategic approach divides into three main areas:
This breakdown ensured that tactics were always in service of the overall goals. Within each of the three timeframes, we focused on a goal-based strategic approach.
The tour was an extended event, with 10 cities over the course of six weeks in the summer and then 4 cities in four weeks in the fall. As with all aspects of our partnership with Trey Ratcliff, research was conducted to determine the best ways to engage Ritz-Carlton consumers and travelers across major social networks, with a primary focus on Instagram to make sure the story of The Ritz-Carlton and the partnership with Trey was being told and consumed by our intended audience.
In order to create excitement and promote participation, we used Facebook's targeting and rich advertising capabilities. To promote participation in each city we crafted a complex series of immersive Facebook Canvases. These Canvases were targeted to locals in each city of the tour. Each Canvas worked "in real time," allowing consumers to look around at highlight shots from previous stops, and then provided a carousel of upcoming cities and dates.
Organic efforts aided in generating exposure for the campaign. The Ritz-Carlton staff were embedded into the tour at key cities in order to create Instagram stories and live-tweet the exciting event and share wisdom and tips from Ratcliff as he spoke with the crowd.
The campaign was a resounding success. Hundreds of eager photographers joined Trey in each city of the tour and we achieved incredible exposure among our target audience.
Our 10-city Facebook Canvases in Europe outperformed all our expectations, reaching 1.6 million targeted consumers at a frequency of 3.79. The Canvas units exceeded benchmark performance with an Ad Recall Lift of 10.67%.
Real-time Instagram stories gave a "behind-the-scenes" look at Trey at various Ritz-Carlton destinations and garnered over 277,000 views in Lisbon and Barcelona alone, and over 500,000 views in Japan. The Ritz-Carlton also hosted Instagram Live interviews between Trey Ratcliff and popular Japanese influencers talking about photography as an extension of his Artist LIVE! series. Part of this effort included hosting a Facebook Live interview between Trey Ratcliff and Megan Morrison of @travelwritedraw in Vienna which generated over 48K Impressions.
All told, The Ritz-Carlton garnered over 27 million paid and organic impressions. It is clear that this was an exciting and effective campaign that was a worthy follow up to the US-based tours done last year. We look forward to extending this campaign into Asia in the future.
