During my 3 year period in an online guided tour aggregator, I discovered that people sometimes spent more time researching about the place they are going to go, than what was the actual time spent on the tour. We tried to solve this issue by presenting the data in an easy and visually appealing way but found out that people liked being immersed in these stories, and the discovery of their upcoming journey. They liked dreaming, imagining on how it will look like. It brought excitement.
Inspiring people, and stirring up emotion, helping them envision the experiences through learning gives them a foretaste of the journey. Longing is a powerful feeling, that can help viewers to make a decision.
Hurtigruten Expedition’s target group wants to learn, and knowledge sharing is an important aspect of their brand. They want to inspire at any stage in the customer journey. A part of their potential is also customers’ dream and trip preparation.
Concept
These “Discover with Us” stories of inspiration have been brought to life nicely through the magazine. It’s consistent. It’s immersive, has a good, adventurous and historic feel. The Tone of Voice has been laid.
Data
In research done by SkiftX and Brand USA over 400 storyteller creators, and industry leaders were surveyed to discover how destinations are using storytelling to inspire travel.
They were asked about strategy, campaign goals, content distribution, and what’s top of mind for the future.
Success comes in many forms, and the same is true for travel storytellers. The ultimate goal of any destination marketing effort is to drive visitation. But in terms of individual campaign success, it’s not just about one metric — it’s about the overall impact of a campaign. The ‘most important’ KPI is not one-size-fits-all.
It’s hard to determine if the content that we made is going to be a complete success because we are playing the long game. Success can be measured by more than whatever immediate engagement is garnered during the initial launch of certain content.
Even though it takes years to convert travel customers, we can make an educated guess, based on data trends.
Content-based social platforms like Instagram and Facebook were ranked top content distribution platforms for reaching the right audience.
In fact, 74% said that producing content for Instagram is more important to their marketing strategy this year than it was last year.
Short video form is the most mentioned format that content creators in the destination travel section intended to produce.
76% said they plan to focus on video but will keep it short as they are easy to consume and can be distributed cross-platforms.
Why, what and where
Short video posts, stories and reels on Social media channels (IG/FB), not longer than 60 seconds in total will move travellers to discover and share.
Keywords: authentic, inspirational, moving, interesting
Putting it all together
Now that we know what needs to be done we can increase the quality perceptions and engagement by optimizing “Discover with Us” for all destinations in a creative way. The goal is to leave them with insights worth sharing and have them inspired and curious to discover more.
The Native Cultures of Arctic Alaska is an engaging narrative that at the moment of this project development was presented in a straightforward and dry manner on web:
It is a page that you can scroll, and get the same information from the magazine but on your screen. It’s not very exciting and does not call for discovery.
The story’s potential is to be brought to life by putting highlights into a nice, visually attractive storyline. Each image followed by condensed information is to pull the viewer to get deeper into the content and find out more with each scroll action:
Each of these condensed highlights is then to be turned into a short video story featuring a scene that pulls deeper into the context of the destination’s story:
Great stories move. They have the power to tap into our emotions and inspire a sense of wanderlust. They take us away from the screen to the unknown.