Four Pillars Hotels wanted to take advantage of the large numbers of Britons who were forecast to take a summer holiday in England. But how would they achieve standout in the hugely competitive UK holiday arena, when they had a limited budget and we were in the grip of a grueling recession? We applied the principles of integrated marketing – after all, it’s at the heart of what MTD do.

Originate

We worked with the client to create a brief, from which we proposed a range of conceptual ideas. ‘Four Summer – Great Value English Holidays’ was chosen because it was a theme which Four Pillars could take ownership of, it would appeal to the wide target audience and conveyed the essence of Four Pillars’ offering in an instant. The fresh, summery look perfectly encapsulated what people want from a quintessential English summer holiday and reflected the Four Pillars Hotels brand.

Integrate

A highly optimised microsite was created, which prospects would be driven to through organic search and the other campaign elements. Prominent Flash movies on the microsite targeting specific customer groups ensured that users were attracted to the enticing offers, while the ease of use, compelling content and prominent calls to action encouraged bookings. An email was broadcast to Four Pillars customers for whom they have an email address, while those customers who prefer not to be contacted by email received a simple postcard mailing. POS, consisting of posters and leaflets, was installed in the hotels, directing people to the website for more information and bookings. A Flash banner was placed on the main Four Pillars site and also the Tourism South East site to drive online traffic to the four-summer.co.uk site.

Accumulate

The campaign, which ran for just two months, achieved a staggering 40:1 return on investment. It was extremely well received by the client and customers alike and has helped to advance Four Pillars’ brand positioning in the leisure market. The website achieved number one (page one, position one) organic rankings on Google for key search terms such as ‘summer breaks oxford’ and ‘summer breaks cotswolds’, as well as page one rankings for highly competitive search terms such as ‘summer breaks england’ and ‘summer holidays england’.