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In Search of the Ideal Visitor The 8 December 2003 edition of the Zeitgeist e-Zine When I work with clients, I often tell the story of Donna Shaw’s “high value customer.” It’s as relevant today as when she turned heads with the concept back in the mid '90s…and it's the cornerstone of New Zealand’s laser beam focused international tourism campaign for 2004. To set the stage, Donna was running the biggest, baddest State Tourism Office in the land. Illinois had a $60+ million budget and a track record of economic impact growth that was second to none. And then Donna dropped the bomb. Camping and State Parks were not going to be included in the upcoming year’s campaign. The consumers that would respond to such ads, “bring their own beer, bring their own bait and bring their own beds." What kind of Return-on-Investment is that, she asked. To be sure, it wasn’t anything like the consumers that would drop $175 a night on a hotel room in Chicago, $100 for dinner, $100 for a show and who knows how much on retail shopping. “That,” she said with a smile, “is the high value consumer.” As always, Donna (now the Cultural Tourism Czarina of Miami Beach and a recent guest on DMOU) was, as my friends in Northwest Ontario say, “bang on.” And so are the folks at New Zealand Tourism…
In a bid to widen that gap between growth in numbers and growth in spending even further, Tourism New Zealand is fine-tuning its marketing efforts to focus on what the agency calls the "ideal visitor". While we all have (or should have) an idea of what our ideal visitor looks like, New Zealand is targeting "interactive travelers" …experienced travelers that eschew relaxation to interacting with the local culture. Like Donna’s “high value customer,” they are likely to be high-income earners, read the business section of the newspaper, enjoy fine wine and are internet savvy. They want to visit New Zealand for an "authentic" experience of the country and tend to stay longer, do more and spend more. And, importantly for an industry with a limited marketing budget, these travelers tend to be, as Seth Godin calls them, sneezers…telling their similarly-disposed friends about their incredible experience. New Zealand believes that their high value customer is roughly 5-8% of the traveling public in their top international markets of Australia, Britain, Canada and the U.S. Having to pursue less than 10% of the traveling universe in their target market surely allows them the luxury of making their marketing dollars go further. And isn’t that the whole point of ROI? Of course, being the home of “middle earth” doesn’t hurt either. So, after you treat yourself to the final installment of the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy this holiday season, take an hour or so to imagine your ideal customer. Is your 2004 marketing plan designed to appeal to this consumer? Your ROI will be significantly higher if it is....
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In
1999, New Zealand launched a campaign called “100% Pure.”
In just four years, annual overseas visitor numbers have risen 33% and
spending by tourists has jumped an impressive 75%. But, that’s
not enough…