Got a travel and tourism business to promote? Learn about the elements you need to create the best travel ads, and a few examples to spark your inspiration.
What do you think of when we say you need to have the best travel ads to attract a responsive audience? Is it aesthetic visuals? What the ad copy says?
Well, you are halfway there. How the ad looks and sounds is only the surface area. What it intends to convey and how it’s meant to do that is another. The best travel ads speak to the audience in their language and effectively convey the brand message. We won’t say it is easy to get that, but using the right strategy and taking inspiration from good examples will surely get you there.
With this blog, let’s understand how you can create great travel advertisements to attract your audience.
A brief about travel ads
Travel ads are a part of marketing campaigns designed to promote the services and products offered by travel businesses. This can be to promote travel destinations, accommodations, activities, tourism boards, travel accessories, and other services. The final aim of travel advertising is to present the products and services to potential travelers with the right demographics and interests.
What You Need to Create The Best Travel Ads
When you come across a good travel advertisement, there’s a lot that goes behind it. To make things easier for you, we have compiled a short list of elements that you will find in almost all travel ads (and can implement in yours!)
Understanding of the audience
People travel for a lot of different reasons. Some do it for leisure, others as a business trip. You need to have a good understanding of your audience in terms of their travel purpose, booking habits, preferred destinations, interests, and online behaviour. You can then tailor your marketing strategies, content, and other offerings that resonate with their travel dreams.
A Brand Voice
One of the most important things you need to stand out is a unique brand voice. It should reflect the company’s personality, mission, values, and overall philosophy. Some brands take up a witty and humorous approach, while others stick to compassion. You can be as adventurous or as straightforward as you want. Just make sure you stay consistent and use the same voice across all platforms.
A USP
A USP, or unique selling proposition, is what will get you noticed. It should effectively communicate what makes the brand stand out and convey the offer to attract specific audiences. It can be based on quality, price, convenience, differentiation, and a combination of these, ultimately highlighting what the brand does better than the others. A well-defined USP is what attracts people towards brands.
A good story
The best travel ads always have a story. They highlight the audience’s desires, needs, pain points, and express them through compelling narratives. You need to make sure that the story emotionally connects with your audience and defines your brand message. Remember that when it comes to travel, people don’t just pay for tickets. They pay for the memories and stories they will ultimately create.
Social proof
This is not a necessity, but it definitely helps. Social proof is anything that portrays the positive experience that past clients and customers have had with the brand. Including this in your brand builds trust and confidence among a newer audience.
Good visuals
If you want to attract people to spend on a destination, then good visuals are everything. This includes using high-quality views of destinations and tourism spots, videos that provide a clear view of the experience, and engaging imagery that showcases the beauty and uniqueness of destinations. Pay attention to the variety of shots you use, the movement you incorporate, and the color grading and composition you implement.
Great copy
Travel ads are incomplete without compelling copy. The words you use to convey your story, value proposition, and offer are essential. The ad copy should complement the visuals, personalize it for the viewers, and ensure the ads resonate with the audience. It should effectively evoke emotions and create vivid imagery that inspires the user to pack their bags and book the next flight.
CTA
What do you want the user to do after seeing your ad? Go to your website? Sign up for more stuff? Purchase? Your CTA, or call-to-action, is going to answer that. Align it with the user’s journey and where they are when they see the ad. For instance, if you’re targeting new people, use ‘Discover more’ instead of ‘Buy now’. Make it captivating enough to convert user interest into action.
Best Examples of Tourism Ads
If you can’t make up your mind on what to do with your ads, here are a few travel advertising examples that can spark your inspiration.
Scotrail by Scotland
Tourism ads often struggle with identifying their target audience, when in fact, the potential market is vast. Scotrail’s recent campaign effectively solves this by showcasing a wide range of audiences and experiences in a single unified campaign.
The campaign shows a bunch of destinations and experiences, from wild outdoor adventures and beautiful beaches to historical and cultural landmarks. It’s made for all, no matter if you want to explore, discover a new place, go back in time, or go somewhere you’ve always wanted to.
Fill your heart with Ireland
This ad campaign by Tourism Ireland is all about celebrating the different ways in which the islands of Ireland fill the hearts of tourists and locals. It’s in the rich history, charming locals, the great outdoors, road trips, and the craic. It’s one of the best travel ads featuring locals and celebrities, all coming together to convince visitors to make Ireland their next vacation spot.
The campaign puts an emphasis on the emotional connection and authenticity by expressing the positive experiences and attraction elements through engaging stories and visuals.
Dubai Presents: A Captivating Sagar
An ad that’s exactly like a movie sounds pretty cool, doesn’t it? That’s what Dubai did in one of their campaigns, Dubai Presents, featuring Zac Efron and Jessica Alba.
The campaign presents Dubai as an entertainment destination by using Hollywood-style posters and trailers designed around popular movie genres. It perfectly captures the diversity of exploration and presents it as multiple stories through a cinematic lens.
Play NZ by New Zealand
When the world couldn’t visit New Zealand, the country took a different approach to invite them to it. This campaign was aimed at inviting the world to Play NZ, an open-world style gaming experience that lets players explore New Zealand’s greatest attractions through a gaming experience. It was marketed as a ‘gaming walkthrough’ by allowing characters and live interaction with the other viewers.
While such virtual experiences can get a bit costly, out-of-the-box thinking like this is definitely encouraged.
Create Your Campaign & Get Results!
Conclusion
The best travel ads blend many elements together to convey them through engaging stories and visuals. It begins with understanding your audience, defining a unique selling proposition (USP), and communicating it through a narrative that aligns with the brand message. Including social proof in a fun and creative manner can enhance your ad campaign.
Ultimately, what matters most is connecting effectively with your audience. You can take the help of travel advertising platforms and start advertising on travel sites where users are most likely to be at. A mix of creativity and strategy is what makes the best travel ads.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Why do we need travel ads?
Ans: We need the best travel ads to inform and persuade potential travelers about the destinations, tourism spots, and other travel services and products.
What do the best travel ads include?
Ans: The best travel ads always speak to the audience with a consistent brand voice and USP, have a good story, include social proof and CTA, and convey it all through good ad copy and visuals.
Which is the best platform for travel advertising?
Ans: Google and 7Search PPC are some of the best platforms for showcasing your travel ads.
What are the best travel ad examples to draw inspiration from?
Ans: You can take inspiration from ads by Scotland, New Zealand, Ireland, and Dubai tourism agencies.
How can small travel businesses benefit from travel ads?
Ans: Small businesses can use the best travel ads to catch more eyes, drive more traffic, and get more sales.
