Your Fall Getaway Campaign

Promote visits to Haldimand County in the fall 2023 for:

• Fall Colours
• Cycling
• Farmers Markets / Breweries / Cidery

As the leaves change colour later in the year than the popular destinations in Northern Ontario, Haldimand County has the opportunity to capture visitors  who missed seeing the fall colours or who are travelling later in the season.

The campaign was based on a carousel ad in social media (Facebook and Instagram), with a slide for each of the focus areas above.

The campaign carrousel included a call to action for prospects to directly book local accommodations (B & Bs, Inns and motels) with a goal to increase spin-off business to our restaurants & shops, during shoulder season which is a predictably slower time of year.

Effectiveness

This campaign garnered a lot attention; it reached 333,172 people and made over 1 million impressions (1,132,302 to be exact)! Hitting the 1 million mark is a major achievement and certainly one the team is proud of.

9,181 people clicked on the ads with women ages 65+ accounting for 27% of all clicks and 21% of all impressions. While women in this group responded well to the campaign overall, the cycling ad performed best with men 65+; they accounted for 18% of all clicks and 15% of all impressions for this ad.

Anecdotally, after the ad campaign was run we heard from a local B & B operator, that they had a group of male cyclists coming to stay, and that it was the first time she had seen this kind of traveler at her accommodations.

Please see the link to Banko Creative Services’ website about the campaign as a successful case study – https://banko.ca/case-study/haldimand-county/

Challenges / Changes

We originally planned on featuring fall colours, fishing and cycling. But we were limited with fishing assets that were current, and decided to make a switch mid-project to replace it with a focus on Farmers Markets / Brewery and cidery which are great fall destinations, while still fitting into our target audience. This was also the first campaign we were running in partnership with a new marketing agency of record for Tourism Haldimand – Banko Creative Services. This posed its own challenges as we educated their staff on Haldimand and our how we want our destination positioned.

Target Audience – visitors who:

• take frequent day and weekend trips
• like to explore new places
• live in urban areas looking for an escape from the city to rural areas
• within a comfortable driving range (GTA, Toronto city centre, Oakville, Burlington, Mississauga, Guelph/Waterloo)
• have access to a vehicle (as we have no public transportation)
• PRIZM segments – Young Urbanites, Flourishing Families, Mature & Secure

Award Category Specifics:

A landing page was created for the Fall Colours – https://tourismhaldimand.ca/road-trip/. To keep the page up-to-date a link to the Ontario Park’s Fall Colour Report was added, which automatically updates the fall colours as they change across the province. It ensured that visitors could plan their trip to ensure they were going to see the best display of colour.

Sustainability

Tourism Haldimand has reduced the number of printed guides and maps in favour of more online resources and digital promotional campaigns, to help cut waste and reduce use of paper resources.  This campaign is one example of our move to digital campaigns.