Queensland woos ‘best companies’ with million-dollar holiday

Tuesday, 22 March 2011 00:01 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Mumba: Tourism Queensland kicked off a global marketing campaign ‘Million Dollar Memo’ on Friday, to boost incentive travel.

The campaign features a contest by which the ‘best company in the world’ will win a million dollars’ worth of holiday expenses for its staff, in Queensland.

Entrants need to send in a 60-second video that explains why their company is the best in the world, and why its employees deserve the million dollar holiday.

The campaign, with a strong viral element to it, follows the successful ‘Best Job in the World’ campaign of 2009, also by Tourism Queensland. The agency partner for both the campaigns is SapientNitro.

Speaking to Business Line, Anthony Hayes, CEO, Tourism Queensland, said, “Our ‘Best Job in the World’ campaign was hugely successful and received over 35,000 video applications from 185 countries. It has only been a few hours since the launch of Million Dollar Memo, and we have interest already from India, Korea, Germany and the US.”

While the previous global campaign showcased Queensland as a destination, the current campaign is expected to boost incentive travel. “We estimate that the incentive tourist spend in Queensland is just A$318 million annually, of the international tourist spends of A$15 billion. Queensland is the top incentive destination in Australia already, and we want to generate interest globally for incentive travel,” Hayes added.

Incentive tourists, or tourists on company or business-sponsored travel, are estimated to spend 2.5 times more than other international visitors, according to the tourism promotion board. The contest is open to companies and workplaces irrespective of size.

A combination of direct marketing and online, including social media, is expected to drive the campaign.

In India, Thomas Cook is the official launch partner for the campaign, informed Ryna Sequeira, Marketing Manager (India), Tourism Queensland.

Hayes said, “Given the cultural and historic relationship we share with India, we believe the country is incredibly important for our future, especially with the incentive market. And this isn’t a one-off promotion; it represents the consumer element of a five-year incentive travel strategy.”

The three phases of the contest are a top 50 short-list (of which five companies would be chosen by a web poll), a final 20 list (three by web poll) and an event in Queensland with representatives of the final 20 companies competing over eight days.