May 7, 2020
The COVID-19 crisis has brought unprecedented challenges to the travel industry and the world. However, as destination marketing organizations around the globe face this incredible adversity, they are continuing their vital work as anchors in their communities by serving local businesses and tourism partners, and planning for recovery.
Our role at Expedia Group Media Solutions is to help support them in their journey. For nearly a decade, we’ve helped cities, states, regions and countries reinvigorate tourism following times of adversity. Working closely with our advertising partners, we’ve activated our disaster recovery program and crisis toolkit to help support advertising partners as they continue to navigate the COVID-19 crisis.
Where Next?
This week, as part of our continued mission to support the travel industry and our advertising partners, we’ve launched a campaign called Where Next? that encourages travelers to continue dreaming of travel even while they stay home to stay healthy.
Running between now and June, the campaign invites travelers to explore destinations virtually and discover stunning full-screen imagery and information on both iconic and lesser known destinations around the world.
Built by our in-house creative agency, Creative Partnerships, this new campaign helps destinations stay at the forefront of traveler’s minds for future travel consideration, paving the way for rebuilding trust with travelers around the world to capture demand when the time is right.
To extend the campaign’s reach and engagement, the website features integrated social sharing capabilities so users can share their choice with friends and family across social channels and help other travelers around the world dream up their next adventure.
The campaign is available on any device across Expedia Group brands—including Expedia.com, Hotels.com, Hotwire, Travelocity, Orbitz, CheapTickets and Vrbo.
Where Next? launched this week, which coincides with the U.S. Travel Association’s annual National Travel and Tourism Week (NTTW). In response to the COVID-19 crisis, NTTW this year is honoring the #SpiritofTravel, with the U.S. Travel Association stating, “Through every crisis in our nation’s history, it’s the spirit of travel that moves America forward.” You can learn more about the #SpiritofTravel here.
Whether inspiring travelers to dream about their next trip, educating them on the state of travel, or capturing demand, we believe that the more we can help destinations and the broader travel industry with recovery efforts and help travelers go places, the more we will all benefit. Travel is essential to people, businesses and economies around the world. Tourism will always play a critical role in reinvigorating the economy and supporting destination recovery after disaster strikes.
This campaign is one example of the steps we are taking to support recovery efforts and reinvigorate tourism. Travel partners can learn more about how to inspire travelers and navigate recovery when the time is right.
