Launched on Australia Day, the promotional body embraces cutting-edge technologies to provide more immersive aquatic and coastal experiences to potential international tourists
Tourism Australia is tapping into a host of cutting-edge virtual reality and 360-degree mobile technologies as part of its latest marketing campaigns promoting Australia to the world.
The latest instalment of the promotional body’s There’s Nothing like Australia campaign uses virtual reality (VR), 360-degree footage to showcase the country’s aquatic and coastal experiences.
On offer through the 17 films are a helicopter ride over the 12 Apostles, sailing the Whitsundays, swimming with sea lions and dolphins in South Australia, cruising Sydney harbour, snorkelling in the Great Barrier Reef, kayaking through Katherine Gorge and walking the Three Capes Track in Tasmania.
Footage can be viewed using a Google Cardboard or Samsung Gear VR headset, as well as without a VR headset, and is accessible across multiple platforms including mobile.
“This campaign has been designed to be incredibly immersive and capture what it feels like to be in Australia and to experience for yourself being on, in or near the water,” said Tourism Australia CMO, Lisa Ronson.
“By using VR and 360 technology, we hope to inspire prospective travellers considering Australia for their next holiday and get them to take that crucial next step towards making a booking.”
Orchestrator of the techfest was creative and production agency, Finch, which partnered with VR and 360-content creation house, VRSE.works, along with Clemenger BBDO Sydney.
Finch director of applied technology, Emad Tahtouh, described the challenge of capturing content for the campaign, as well as the volume of material, as the most significant and rewarding of last year. In total, Finch and Wrse.works captured 17 VR films, shot over 36 days.
To get the job done, eight weeks were spent in pre-production, testing camera designs, techniques and technologies. Teams then built eight custom VR rigs, three drones, 41 cameras and a suite of software tools supporting the VR project.
The Google Cardboard and Samsung Gear VR apps showcase the 360 footage in 4K. The Samsung Gear VR app also uses high-definition 4K renditions of the pre-loaded footage to showcase the 17 films.
Alongside the fresh footage, films incorporate user-generated content from Tourism Australia’s social media fans as well as from partners, tourism operators and Sir David Attenborough’s Great Barrier Reef documentary.
Tourism Australia flagged its intention to explore VR 18 months ago as part of ongoing efforts to be “the nation’s storyteller”, its former CMO, Nick Baker, said at the time. Other local brands experimenting with VR for marketing and customer engagement include REA Group, and Qantas.
The immersive campaign was unveiled during a launch event in New York on Australia Day eve, and attended by Australian foreign minister, the Hon. Julie Bishop, along with Tourism Australia’s latest global ambassador, Chris Hemsworth. The event was hosted by Australian chef, Curtis Stone, and featured a specially designed Australian menu devised by celebrity chef, Luke Mangan.
Other activities on the night at Bryant Park included VR displays, a digital aquarium and aquatic-themed images projected onto the park’s ice rink.
According to Tourism Australia managing director, John O’Sullivan, 70 per cent of international tourists to Australia participate in an aquatic or coastal experience, making this content a vital part of how the country showcases itself to the world.
The campaign also incorporates broadcast and digital assets and sits alongside Tourism Australia’s other marketing activities around food and wine and indigenous experiences.
More from CMO on virtual reality in marketing:
Follow CMO on Twitter: @CMOAustralia, take part in the CMO conversation on LinkedIn: CMO ANZ, join us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CMOAustralia, or check us out on Google+: google.com/+CmoAu
Creating a strong company culture may sound like a daunting task, but it’s actually pretty straightforward. In fact, company culture is created in exactly the same fashion as a religion or democracy. Behaviours created from the organisation’s inception are reinforced over time by leadership, attracting like-minded people and eventually reaching critical mass to become an accepted ‘truth’.
The question I get asked most regularly these days is: ‘Do I need to rebuild my company’s systems on Blockchain?’ And the answer, every time, is ‘No, you’re asking the wrong question’.
Throughout my career, I have witnessed a litany of brand names that profess to have a unique customer value proposition (CVP). In reality, however, they’ve had little more than a ‘value proposition’: A simple list of benefits applied to a general audience.
In this bonus last episode of this new podcast series, BrandHook MD, Pip Stocks, talks with former ANZ group general manager of marketing, Louise Eyres, talks about the importance of thinking like a customer and using intuition to solve customer painpoints.
Your site is very meaningful.you have presented a very valuable article.https://www.baneh.comgoodluck
فروشگاه اینترنتی
ACCC releases Consumer Data Right draft framework for comment
RE: Sales and marketing SLAs, often the choke point isn't the teams but them getting the data into the tools they want to use with the da...
Ed Fry
Why sales and marketing alignment is more important than ever
Thank you for the good and very helpful information. It is very interesting. I love all the things you share and see your beautiful creat...
รัตนาวดี ภูมิวรรณ
Former eHarmony marketing chief joins telco startup
Colin Kaepernick, not Mike Kapernick.
thisisw
Zenith's innovation leader: Mid-digital age not benefitting media, brands or consumers
AGA KHAN HOSPITAL is in need of kidney donors for the sum of 2 crore, Contact us today if you want to sell your kidney for money, and thi...
Sebastian Friedrich
Mindshare gets behind blockchain advertising alliance