Tourism Australia's global tourism campaign, There's nothing like Australia, has received international industry recognition, with two category wins at this year's Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) Gold Awards.
The campaign, which was launched in May 2010, picked up the top 'Grand' award in the overall marketing category as well as a 'Gold' award for its interactive website, www.nothinglikeaustralia.com, an integral part of the overall campaign.
Tourism Australia Managing Director Andrew McEvoy believes that using Australians to promote Australia overseas has been a critical element in the campaign's success.
"These awards are really a pat on the back for the people of Australia, who brought their country to life by sharing their favourite Australian place or experience with the world," Mr McEvoy said.
"Australians are very proud of Australia and told us that they wanted to help promote their country to people overseas.
"They are the experts on what makes Australia unlike anywhere else and getting them to share their stories and experiences has helped make this campaign the huge success it has been.
"This is a campaign that has been designed to last for years. The line, There is nothing like Australia, will be our tagline for many, many years to come.
"Winning awards is nice but it's important tourism campaigns work - and this one is. Australia's inbound tourism achieved solid growth of six per cent last year despite major economic challenges in many of our key overseas markets - a very credible achievement when many of our competitors have suffered declines," Mr McEvoy said.
There's nothing like Australia was developed in distinct phases. During the first phase, Australians uploaded nearly 30,000 stories and images to www.nothinglikeaustralia.com to show the world why they should visit - making it one of Australia's most successful consumer-generated promotions ever.
For the next phase of the campaign, Tourism Australia used all the entries to create an interactive digital map of Australia, made up of the things Australians think are special about the country. Located on www.australia.com, which attracts more than a million unique visitors each month, and also at www.nothinglikeaustralia.com, it is searchable by experience type, location, and by 1,000 keywords.
The marketing campaign and website were launched at the end of May 2010, alongside print and digital advertising, plus a video advert broadcast in cinemas and online.
Globally, 26 of Tourism Australia's 33 overseas markets are now running their own language version of the campaign website, which collectively receives more than three million unique visitors each month, each spending an average of 2.73 minutes on the site. So far, 4,983 photos have been uploaded by international visitors to Australia.
The Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) is a non-for-profit membership association for the Asia Pacific travel and tourism industry. Tourism Australia has been a member of PATA since 1951.
The 2011 PATA Gold Awards are sponsored by the Macau Government Tourist Office and recognise the achievements of 20 separate organisations and individuals. This year's awards attracted more than 223 individual entries from 102 organisations and individuals worldwide.
The awards ceremony will take place on Monday, April 11, 2011 at China World Hotel during the PATA 60th Anniversary and Conference, Beijing, China.
