The Campaign

The creative idea was to reveal Vivid Sydney from new perspectives by creating a content-led, multiplatform media relations campaign in consultation with media outlets to: • Overcome issues with media company's diminishing resources. • Prevent media fatigue by offering new glimpses into the festival including behind-the-scenes stories. • Create ‘shareable’ content to ensure fast, regular coverage. • Break down the extensive program into bespoke stories to ensure coverage across Light, Music and Ideas and prevent media becoming overwhelmed.

Execution

In addition to developing international and domestic travel packages, creating newspaper lift-outs, digital and social media campaigns, media relations included: • Creating media materials such as story matrixes, timelapse and video, photographs, infographic data, VNRs, 29+ media releases, content galleries, artistic renders, photography, and more. • Hosted a launch event attended by NSW Premier and 80 local/international media. It was live streamed globally. • Briefed editors, producers, photographers and reporters at major media houses and digital platforms. • Secured exclusive interviews for high profile program talent • Hosted a week of media ‘preview nights’ and an Opening Night media event • Facilitated 2000+ TV pieces • Hosted more than 126 visiting international and interstate media • Undertook issues management when severe weather forced Vivid to close for two nights • Announced record breaking visitor numbers to conclude campaign The highly focused campaign reached out to 3000+ media over 3 months.

Tier 1: Vivid Sydney 2016 was the most successful to date. Ongoing content provision saw more media coverage with new angles and prevented media fatigue. The most oft-repeated headline in media coverage was biggest and best festival Tier 2: • 13000+ clips were secured in 2016 • 96% of coverage included key messages, 92% featured destination messaging, 99% was positive • 126 visiting media attended up 27% • 92% of coverage included an image or multimedia content Tier 3: • More than 2.31 million visitors attended Vivid Sydney, an increase of 35%. • More than 186,000 people attended Music and Ideas events • Hotel partner Accor reported a 34% increase in rooms sold • 88,300 international and domestic packages sold, up 104% • Visitor from China up 55.7%, from Singapore up 242.1% and Japan up 346.9%.

The Situation

Vivid Sydney is the world's largest festival of light, music and ideas. In 2016, attendance increase by 35% to 2.31 million visitors, and international visitors increased by 104%. The media relations campaign was vital to these results. More than 13,000 clips were secured, and more than 3000 media dealt with in Australia and internationally. This campaign represents next-gen media relations with its focus on creating multimedia, multiplatform, and shareable content for maximum PR results. Its efficacy is evident with more than 92% of all coverage including PR-developed content.

The Strategy

Extensive research (15,000+ interviews, online studies and focus groups) determined visitor source markets as: • Primary domestic - Victoria and Queensland. • Secondary domestic - Canberra, South Australia and Western Australia. • International primary markets - USA, New Zealand, UK, Germany, India, China, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, and Japan. Research with domestic and international media showed demand for multimedia content and format, delivery times and bespoke approaches. Our strategic approach was to show new perspectives on Vivid Sydney'splice and dice' story angles by media and by target audience passion points to elicit maximum coverage. The call to action was to go to Vivid Sydney over multiple nights and visit the website for precinct and event details.