VisitBritain’s new campaign is quirky, mad and standout different. It’s still wonderfully British. After all, British humour is legendary and Monty Python is British.
The campaign is called See Things Differently and it definitely lives up to its name.
The launch commercial, Spill the tea on Great Britain, uses collage art to present a UK beyond red buses and tea, ironically playing on Britain’s love of tea to highlight its surfing, music festivals and street art. The 2023 campaign aims to capitalise on a bounce back in tourism and this first phase, with a budget of £9.8 million, will focus on the countries recovering most strongly, the US, Canada, the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, France, Germany and Spain.
The hero commercial will be supported by tea-themed cutdowns, each focussing on one attraction – surfing, festival, monsters, street art. A limited release of the themed teas, blended by British tea company, Tregothnan, will also be available for tastings at VisitBritain promotional and trade events.
The media plan will include branded content across social media, digital display, digital out-of-home billboards in the Paris Metro and print.
A secondary campaign in Canada and the US the campaign called Fake (Br)it Till You Make It highlights Britain’s regional diversity using its local accents and dialects. In late March, a new online game on VisitBritain’s consumer website, uses machine learning to give visitors a fun go at mastering the accents with links to destination information to drive bookings.
The campaigns also plan to capture major events in 2023 including the Coronation of King Charles III in May and Liverpool hosting the Eurovision Song Contest, on behalf of Ukraine, also in May.
Both campaigns were developed from VisitBritain’s research into motivations for travel now, with discovering new and surprising experiences high on the wish list. Both use a mix of on-and-offline channels including short films and branded content across social media, digital display advertising, for example digital billboards in the Paris Metro, and print media. Content also drives online traffic to VisitBritain’s consumer website with ideas and links to activities, attractions and experiences themed around See Things Differently using #lovegreatbritain. VisitBritain is also working with partners large and small from Lastminute.com in Europe and British Airways to local attractions.
