By means of its latest business events marketing campaign, Tourism Australia has begun extending invitations to major corporations across the globe to consider Australia as the destination of choice for their next business event.
Aimed at attracting more corporate events and incentive groups to our shores, Tourism Australia’s new $2.6 million “Re-energise in Australia” campaign was launched by the Federal Minister for Tourism, Fran Bailey in February this year in Melbourne. Now well underway, the much-anticipated campaign is utilising personalised direct mail and online activities to present a motivating invitation to around 800 corporate decision makers from a number of industry sectors across 11 countries.
The campaign employs a multi-level strategy whereby recipients are identified as belonging to one of the following three target markets:
• Corporate decision maker – this person ultimately approves any decision on where a business event will take place.
• Corporate influencer – those within a corporate entity who recommend the destination and venue for incentives and corporate meetings, and are often given the task of gathering information and putting an event proposal together (i.e. event managers, sales and marketing managers).
• Corporate intermediary – those who actively market business event destinations, take bookings and do much of the organising (i.e. travel agents, incentive houses).
The first step of the campaign involves the direct mailing of an Australian gift. ‘Decision makers’ receive an aboriginal artwork with an accompanying booklet, whereas ‘influencers’ and ‘intermediaries’ receive an Apple iPod containing a podcast on the destination parcelled in a didgeridoo pack.
Once the influencers and intermediaries receive their gifts, they’re asked to confirm their contact details on their personalised webpage. Tourism Australia will then arrange for a second package to be sent off to them, which contains an events kit made up of three books – a functional 2007 diary, a coffee table-style book containing images of incentive experiences in Australia, and a reference guide of destinations within Australia.
 The first wave of this direct marketing component is currently taking place, with packages being sent out to selected recipients operating within the sectors of manufacturing, automotive, medical, technology, pharmaceutical, cosmetics, direct selling, insurance, finance/banking and retail in the UK, North America and Asia (China, Taiwan, Korea, Malaysia, Thailand, Hong Kong, India and Singapore) as these countries deliver the bulk of Australia’s business events business.
Reflecting on the utilisation of user-friendly technology and engaging content, Ms Bailey said she was positive about the campaign, and described it as “clever”.
“Rather than a sweeping approach, it engages the key decision makers with our innovative technology as well as direct and online marketing,” she says.
“By targeting business events, we can attract even more big spending tourists who spend valuable dollars in regional Australia.”
The success of the campaign lies in the direct mailing component, as Ian McFarlane, director of marketing for Tourism Australia explained at a subsequent press conference held during the recent AsiaPacific Incentives and Meetings Expo (AIME). Mr McFarlane said that this initial wave would establish an ongoing line of communication between Tourism Australia and key international decision makers.
While the direct mail component will initially reach 800 decision makers, Mr McFarlane said there are plans to build on the number of recipients as the campaign progresses. He envisaged a “real” personalised invite would be the next step, such as hosting events for key decision makers to give them a face-to-face experience.
At this stage, the campaign is targeting corporate business events, with event delegates spending on average six times more per day than leisure tourists ($554 per day compared to $94 per day). Mr McFarlane said Tourism Australia was keen to look into the association market in the future, and that they are currently reviewing and researching a program for targeting this market. He expects a decision to be made on a possible campaign targeting associations by the mid- to third-quarter of 2007.
Tourism Australia expects the current campaign will result in an upturn of business events within the next two to three years. In 2006, 786,000 business and conference tourists visited Australia, an increase of seven per cent.
News of the campaign and its elements has been greeted with mixed reaction from the business events industry. Without much of a lead up to the actual announcement, the launch of the campaign came as a surprise to some.
While any action was welcomed, there’s some scepticism around the campaign and the benefits it will bring the business events market in Australia.
The Australian Association of Convention Bureaux has come out in strong support of the program, saying it is a significant step in the right direction. Australian Association of Convention Bureaux president, Robyn Hendry, says the initiative is an excellent start to attracting more international buyers to Australia and a sound strategic step to building the lucrative business events market in Australia.
“This is a content rich tactical campaign that will ideally fit into a broader industry strategy to grow the business events market,” Ms Hendry said. While Tourism Australia is to be congratulated for the initiative, Ms Hendry said that now is the ideal time to build other strategic avenues and approaches that will help Australia seize a bigger share of the international business events pie.
“This is a wonderful start to a new campaign, and we look forward to working with the Federal Tourism Minister and Tourism Australia to develop more such initiatives and complimentary tactics to further increase activity in the sector.”
Long-time member of the business events fraternity, Elizabeth Rich, was also complimentary.
“It’s great to see this direct mail corporate campaign up and running after an extended gestation,” she said.
“Unfortunately I missed the launch but the material I’ve seen so far looks to be excellent quality. I was interested to read of the $2.6 million budget to reach around 400 companies plus intermediaries, so the campaign certainly has seen a substantial investment by Tourism Australia.
“It has clever high-tech elements which will need to be reinforced by personal follow-up with the targets in what is a very relationship-based sector. And the beauty of this sort of campaign is that it can be measured, so we look forward to hearing of strong results coming through.”
ICMS Australasia’s managing director, Bryan Holliday, did raise some concerns, but he believes it is “a terrific first step to realising the enormous potential of this high yield sector.”
“However, I’m a bit surprised to discover that they’re investing over $2 million in just the corporate market. I understand that campaigns to attract customers from the association market may follow but even so, spending so much on one sector seems extraordinary in this time of limited financial resources. Hopefully the campaign will work and I look forward to seeing the results.
“I’m even more thrilled that Australia’s convention centres and bureaux are combining in a campaign to attract the much higher yielding association market to our shores [see story page 9]. May the best campaign win.”
Other “off the record” comments received by mice.net magazine included:
“It’s a 2007 diary and they’ll get it when? In June?” – in relation to the desk diary that is part of the strategy.
“That’s an absolute waste of money and tripe.”
“It’s a scandal. An absolute scandal. They’ve spent $2.6 million on 10 per cent of the market – the corporates and incentive houses.”
“They’ll [those targeted in the direct mail campaign] give the ipod to their kids.”
“I might flip through the book, the diary’s no use, and I don’t have any time to watch videos on an ipod.”
“I think Tourism Australia’s production and literature values are very high.”
“They’re doing something for business events rather than nothing. And that’s something.”
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