Destinations Council Destiny Awards > Short-Term Marketing Campaign

Speakeasy Activation in Chicago

About This Entry:

What was the problem you were trying to fix? Or what was your opportunity? Visit KC wanted to expand its regional reach and increase travel from Chicago to Kansas City in 2017 by inspiring, engaging, educating, entertaining and, ultimately, showing Chicagoans how KC does arts and culture.

Who is the target audience/market for this project? Keeping arts and culture offerings in mind, we targeted three primary Visit KC leisure travel audiences – Active Singles, Young Families and Modern Matures – within the Chicago market.

Cost: Please indicate the cost or budget for this project. Entries in the Marketing Program categories should indicate the budget allocated for the promotion or program. The budget was $220,000 total, including all activation elements and paid media support targeted to the Chicago market during the month of August.

OVERVIEW

Kansas City is amid a new golden age – a renaissance of the arts, culture, cuisine and pretty much everything else. It’s a momentum that extends to every neighborhood, restaurant and experience in Kansas City. And it’s time everyone else got in on the secret. So, we developed an integrated experiential marketing campaign to give Chicago a chance to join in on the fun and learn all about Kansas City’s hidden gems.

Visit KC wanted to inspire visitation in an unexpected and engaging way. That’s why we created a one-night only speakeasy event that paid homage to KC’s past, while staying true to the How We Do KC brand. The overall idea of the campaign was focused on driving as much engagement and traffic as possible during a short time period to see a lift in economic impact. While specific goals were set for sweepstakes entries, engagements, engagement value and impressions, Visit KC wanted to hone in on a main overall goal of driving $1.5 million in total estimated economic impact from this campaign.

Campaign Strategy:

To accomplish Visit KC’s objectives, we implemented a month-long campaign targeted heavily to the Chicago market using a mix of PR, social media, content creation, digital media, influencers, on-the-ground efforts and email outreach that culminated in a one-night-only, password-required Kansas City speakeasy event in Chicago.

To ensure a good outcome, we took the following measures to get people aware of our event and Visit KC. We teamed up with the Boulevard Brewery booth at Chicago’s Windy City Smokeout to hand out 4,000 fans to announce the activation. We sent out a series of emails targeting meeting planners and media to save the date and employed strong social media efforts driving to the Facebook event page. We also launched a “Find Your Kansas City Spirit” social media sweepstakes on Facebook, encouraging entrants to answer a series of questions to determine their ideal local cocktail get entered to win a trip to Kansas City. We created targeted programmatic high-impact mobile units that allowed us to measure Kansas City arrivals via verified walk-in reporting and designed engaging takeovers, custom editorial content and a multitier PR approach. This targeted local Chicago media and freelance contributors to the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Sun-Times, Forbes Travel Guide, Time Out Chicago, Windy City Live TV, Thrillist, FoodNetwork.com and Meat + Poultry. We invited four Chicago-based influencers to KC the weekend prior to the Chicago speakeasy event to explore hidden gems, share content and then return to attend the event in their hometown to continue that conversation with their followers. Lastly, we surprised and delighted Chicagoans in high-traffic locations around the city with impromptu Kansas City jazz performances and locally sourced, ice-cold treats the day before the event.

Results:

All efforts culminated with the speakeasy event in Chicago on Aug. 23. We transformed an underground secret bar in the heart of the city into a not-so-secret, one-night-only speakeasy party. More than 350 Chicagoans, media, influencers and meeting planners lined up to gain entrance and learn more about Kansas City’s hidden gems while enjoying Kansas City jazz musicians and unique performances served with KC chef-prepared appetizers and vintage handcrafted cocktails. Media and meeting planners were invited into a special VIP section to gain access to the musical and culinary talent, while all guests walked away with a personal KC Best-Kept Secrets Guide to lesser-known bars, restaurants, arts and things to do when visiting.

Success was evaluated based on achieving a substantial economic impact through collective impressions, engagement and visitor information.

We accomplished reaching our goal of total estimated economic impact of $1.5 million for the Chicago campaign. Attendance at the speakeasy event was positively overwhelming, and our Facebook event page had over 2,000 people engaged on its own – more than we could have anticipated! Based on the success of this Chicago campaign and seeing that the market performed better year over year, Visit KC determined that Chicago will officially be a key core target market in their consideration set for 2018 media to drive continued engagement and visitation.

We had the following results with our events. We received 1,560 entries for our social media sweepstakes. Our social organic impressions reached 6.1 million, which were 152 percent over our initial goal. The influencer impressions reach 4.8 million, which were 160 percent over our goal. Traffic on the VisitKC.com website increased by 57 percent year over year. Our media engagements of 243,978 came to be 243 percent over our goal. The cost per engagement was $0.46 with a reduction in cost of 71 percent. The average engagement value was $6.11 making it 118 percent over our goal. The engagement value per dollar was 13.18 which was 308 percent over the anticipated goal. The total estimated economic impact was $1.5 million with 100% of our goal reached and 3.4 percent incremental impact.

Why This Is A Finalist: 

This campaign had it all. It is as if they moved Kansas City to Chicago for this campaign. Every channel that could be used was used to target the Chicago audience. They ran PR, social media, content creation, digital media, influencers, on-the-ground efforts and email outreach that culminated in a one-night-only, password-required Kansas City speakeasy event in Chicago. There were in-market, impromptu Kansas City jazz performances Kansas City culinary favorites. Program partners were identified through Kansas City’s flavor and music. They immersed their 350 event attendees in Kansas City culture at their speakeasy event. They exceeded their social impressions by 152 percent of goal, influencers by 160 percent of goal, saw a 57 percent increase traffic on VisitKC.com, and the total estimated economic impact was $1.5 million.