Rewards Wonder Campaign

The Hon. D.G.E. HOOD (15:00): My question is to the Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment. Will the minister please update the chamber on the success thus far of the Rewards Wonder campaign?

The Hon. D.W. RIDGWAY (Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment) (15:00): I thank the honourable member for his ongoing interest in the tourism sector. As members would know, the South Australian Tourism Commission recently launched the Rewards Wonder campaign, in fact, in early September, with an unbranded teaser campaign entitled 'Tell us where', which was rolled out in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide, targeting consumers on their daily commute.

Consumers were driven to an unbranded 'Tell us where' microsite to enter a competition to identify each location, with a major travel prize on offer. It resulted in some 4,000 entries and close to 10,000 comments, reactions and likes across social media during its two-week run. Southustralia.com experienced its biggest two weeks of traffic in the website's history after the locations were revealed, with visits from the Australian domestic customers increasing by some 30 per cent. Phase 2 of the campaign launched on 1 October, with a five-day live stream generating the following results:

21,274 Australian Tourism Data Warehouse leads to operators within two weeks, the highest two weeks on record;

an all-time daily record of domestic traffic to southaustralia.com, with some 20,452 visits on 5 October;

more than 3 million organic and paid impressions through Facebook;

113,357 total viewers;

7,802 engagements from Facebook live; and

255,461 visits to southaustralia.com thus far since the campaign launch, with almost 60 per cent of unique visitors to the Rewards Wonder page being from interstate.

One of the main aims of the live stream was to pique people's interest. I happened to be in Melbourne on the day it was launched and saw the footage screening on the giant screen in Federation Square. With the half hour time difference, there were people going home from the daily commute, and there was a large amount of interest as people walked past Federation Square to Spencer Street station, or the other way, looking up and asking each other where this image was from.

While the five-day live stream has concluded, the campaign is ongoing and aimed at continuing to drive awareness and interest in South Australia as a destination, and converting this interest into bookings. Since the campaign's implementation, the SATC has developed a database of two million consumers who have been captured via the campaign's ads, and the SATC can now retarget these consumers with flight and retail sales offers.

This is now taking place with Virgin Australia, with other airline activity planned for the remainder of the year. For example, from 15 to 21 October one-way sale fares for $95 were offered from Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane, as they are our key markets. Through the online platform, consumers will be able to see what is on offer in our state and can click through and view itineraries, highlights, accommodation and experiences that they are able to book.

The Rewards Wonder campaign has had a significant impact on creating awareness of South Australia amongst our target audience. The campaign has been well received by consumers, and this is demonstrated by the number of views and the level of engagement.

The feedback from the industry has also been very positive, with initial results indicating spikes in leads to tourism operators websites from southaustralia.com. As an example, one operator who featured in the ad campaign has been reporting strong bookings, with 8 October being its highest ever day for tour bookings. Another operator last year had five people book an experience in the year; since featuring in the ad they have had five bookings in two weeks.

I am very excited about the ongoing results of this campaign and the impact it will have helping us to deliver our 2020 target of $8 billion of visitor expenditure by that year.