Project Background
For a junior year project, I was assigned to a faux agency where we were tasked with giving a random brand some new life. My agency was assigned the travel company Travelocity. We came up with a revived social media image for their mascot, as well as a new interactive feature on their website.
My Role: Team Strategist
Brand Background
Back in the late 90’s, travel companies were rushing to get on the Internet, and Travelocity was born from Sabre Interactive in 1996, released publicly in 2000. Today, they’re owned by one of their competitors, Expedia. 20 years later, they’re not quite up there with the leading travel companies. People know their mascot, the Roaming Gnome, but can’t quite identify what company the gnome belongs to.
Business Problem
Today, Travelocity is struggling to keep up with bigger companies like Expedia, Hotel.com and booking.com. People aren’t booking total packages, but rather separately to get the lowest costs, using new sites like Airbnb.
Audience
Travelocity’s current audience is between 30s and mid 50s. We need to shift this target audience to take advantage of the current young travelers.
Today’s Culture
Today, we see travelers who are easily influenced and inspired by what they see on social media. People follow travel influencers, TikTok stars, and young famous people who post about their travels. To them, anything is possible… as long as they can stay cheap.
Target Audience
The Sporadic Explorer
“I saw a boob bounce house in New York City on my IG explore page. It was the Museum of Sex, I definitely need to go there”
“I save photos on IG of influencers in my dream locations. I have a collection of my bucket list vacations.”
Inspired by dream vacations they see on social media, Gen Z travelers are starting to travel more and further. Spring break to Miami? More like Bali on a budget. These travelers want trendy locations with exciting things to do.
Consumer Insight
They tend to plan vacations based off places they see or hear about through social media.
Objective
Establish Travelocity as the go-to vacation company for the Sporadic Traveler, where faraway places are within reach.
Strategy
Travelocity is young, hip, and here to help.
Social Media
Many consumers can’t accurately identify what company our Roaming Gnome is associated with. We’re ready to go viral on social media, and become well known within our target audience.
Roaming Gnome is the next Twitter influencer. He’s laid back and goes with the flow of life… which usually means he ends up on a beach with one too many drinks.
By Tweeting often, with many fun, relatable captions, we hope to attract a younger audience who will then be inspired to check out our website, which has some fun features.
The Problem with Gen Z
In our research, we found many people can’t be bothered with planning. As long as they book the flight, they’re set… until they’re stuck in a city hotel with nothing to do because their lack of planning.
Our Solution
MyBudgetCalculator
This budget calculator allows people to play with the possibilities. Users can input links to activities and see how they affect their final budget. This allows for users to become excited with the thought of travel, as well as avoid boredom while on vacation.
What This Means for Travelocity
We aim to connect with thing new generation of travelers. By making the Roaming Gnome more of a likable, interactive personality, we hope to strengthen his association to Travelocity. Through out social media pages, we will attract younger people to our website where they can play with our fun new calculator feature and be more inclined to use our website for any future travels.