What’s love got to do with it?
Philadelphia Tourism
The Greater Philadelphia Tourism Marketing Corporation needed a new creative approach to promote the long-running Philly Overnight® hotel package. The package and prior creative campaigns had been the most successful tourism initiative in America post 9/11. However, the country was in the middle of one of the worst economic times ever. To have any chance at success we needed to really listen to how folks were feeling about spending their ever-dwindling fun funds.
Sure we knew the facts about our target audience: They were adults living within approximately a two-hour drive of the city, most likely married with kids. But when we started listening to their true thoughts and feelings about a getaway in times like this, we couldn’t believe our ears. We heard a lot of moms and dads saying essentially that they wanted a more grown-up alternative to their parent-filled entertainment lives of Cheetah Girls concerts, Pixar movies and dinners at Friendly’s, but the annual trip to the Outer Banks or Aspen was not in the economical cards this year. Hey, they loved their kids, but they’d like to have a little “couple” time, too. The mall’s fine, but what about a night out at the theatre or a fine restaurant? And not having kids running into their bedroom at any given time was a plus, too!
As John Lennon once wrote, “All you need is love.” That was the beautifully simplistic message applied to this tough challenge. From there it took only one word—or symbol, in this case—to do the trick. Robert Indiana’s iconic Philly LOVE statue was used as an icebreaker of sorts to instantly remind our audience that Philadelphia possessed all the “grown-up” arts, culture and entertainment their hearts desired.
Our audience had a lot of commuters, and were also quite web-savvy, so we decided to have a conversation with them via multiple channels that featured posters and outdoor along heavily traveled public transit and highways, signage at the Philadelphia airport, ads in The Philadelphia Inquirer and banners on key Philly-centric websites.
Even in these bleak economic times, love conquered all. The campaign, coupled with savvy marketing and public relations support from GPTMC, was a success. The number of rooms sold per night was up more than 30% over the same offer marketed with the same budget the year before. With “flat being the new up,” a 30% increase city-wide represented a huge feat. Plus, hotel occupancy actually surpassed some figures set during similar dates in both 2007 and 2008—with an amazing 96% occupancy on Valentine’s Day.
