PROGRAMME

Digital is no longer a nice-to-have in tourism: It’s the driving force behind monumental changes taking place within the visitor economy. As we get to grips with these opportunities coming to the fore in 2024 and beyond, we must ask ourselves as tourism marketers: How can we harness and leverage things like AI and first-party data to drive value and long-team resilience? Zac Watson, GM of Maverick Digital, shares a future of opportunity, consumer centricity and agility as tourism marketing continues to respond to the shifting technology landscape.

Hands-on, practical and pragmatic are the themes of Destination: Digital’s 2023 format. We took your feedback and have curated a workshop-style delegate experience where you’ll come away with tangible, strategic actions to apply to your own brand and role. Alex Dykman, Founder of Maverick Digital will share the best ways to maximise impact from this exciting new delivery format.

As the tools available to tourism marketers continue to change at break-neck speed, operators and destinations are often left wondering how to adapt quickly and work within a new performance marketing landscape. Stu Lill, Head of Client Services at Maverick Digital, will share key changes around third-party data and the effects these are having on performance marketing and attribution. From there, he’ll explore the best ways to gather and leverage your own first-party data, with learnings relevant to both large operators and smaller businesses. From there, Stu will cover the importance of a ‘stronger together’ approach, and the value this can drive when it comes to data sharing and a ‘stay longer, do more’ strategy.

Join Scott McNab, Chief Revenue Officer at RealNZ, as he shares the operator’s journey to a ‘digital-first’ approach. Scott will share real-life business examples and their associated impacts, including his teams utilisation of first-party data and the way RealNZ is navigating the fast-changing performance marketing landscape.

Taking learnings from both Stu and Scott, delegates will begin a workshop focusing on first-party data channel identification and gathering strategies as well as potential collaborators before exploring how to leverage and maximise its value within a tourism marketing strategy.

Learn from fellow tourism marketing peers and their thoughts and ideas around maximising value from consumer data.

AI is transforming the way travellers plan, experience and remember their journeys. Join Tim Olson, Technical Director at Maverick Digital, as he explores the current opportunities and limitations of AI specifically for tourism marketers. We’ll learn more about what big brands like booking.com are doing, what is available to owner/operators right now, and the things we should focus on the most to cut through the AI noise.

 

Gaze in to the crystal ball of social media and tourism marketing and learn from our diverse range of panellists. From short-form content to the low-down on TikTok and X, explore how AJ Hackett Bungy New Zealand, Roady and Tourism Fiji are amplifying value and using social to nurture brand preference and audience action.

The conscious traveller represents a new era of mindful exploration, driven by a deep awareness of social and environmental considerations. This evolving mindset underscores a shift towards sustainable travel, where each holiday is an opportunity to foster change and contribute to the well-being of the destinations being visited. With more than three-quarters of travellers globally wanting to travel more sustainably over the next 12 months, join Alex Dykman as we explore the impact of applying a ‘mindset over demographic’ approach to tourism marketing with specific reference to the conscious traveller movement.

Join Eve Lawrence, GM Haka Tours, as she shares the operator’s journey from a strong backpacker focus to the audience focus of today – the Conscious Traveller. Eve explores the shift from demographic to mindset, its importance for the future and the impact this has had for both product development and marketing.

Taking learnings from both Alex and Eve, delegates will begin a workshop focusing on the conscious traveller and the impact mindset over demographic targeting has on performance marketing strategies. Delegates will build a list of tactics or action points to implement that lift appeal from the conscious traveller, including clarifying which messaging appeals the most, which platforms have the best cut-through, and how to turn the conscious traveller from guest to brand ambassador.

Learn from fellow tourism marketing peers and their thoughts and ideas around integrating a mindset over demographic approach to their marketing strategy.

Just how far can passion, determination (and a splash of Kiwi ingenuity) take you? For our Keynote Speaker Shaun Quincey, it’s seen him be the first to row solo from Australia to Aotearoa, launch one of NZ’s fastest-growing financial startups, and become an influential entrepreneur in the FinTech world.

World records and record business success don’t magically appear overnight – and Shaun’s korero will shed a light on his mentality and grit, as we take lessons from his epic voyage and corporate career and apply them to blue-sky tourism marketing.

From adversity to opportunity, dreams to reality – be prepared to be well-and-truly inspired.

We look forward to seeing you next year – all the best for 2024!