“It’s Scary Being The First Brand On A New Platform”

Closeup portrait of nervous, stressed young woman, girl, employee student biting fingernails looking anxiously, craving for something isolated on green background. Human emotions expressions, feelings

It takes some courage to take the leap of faith with a new advertising offering. However, being a self-confessed innovative brand, youth tour company Contiki gets jittery just thinking about new opportunities.

Such a new offering emerged when Contiki teamed up with music streaming site Guvera, declaring itself the first brand on board the new music platform.

Guvera is unique in its advertising offering as it doesn’t serve ads that interrupt the listener. Rather, one of the options available is a Branded Channel, where a brand curates its own channel with playlists, songs and music, which is what Contiki were so excited, albeit a little nervous, about.

“It can always be a little bit nerve-racking being the tester, being the first to market,” admits Contiki’s head of marketing, Brett Morgan.

However, Morgan stresses Contiki is one of those out-there, experimentation brands.

“We really like to lead in those things and Contiki is a youth brand and an innovative brand,” he says, adding how the brand is really keen on exploring native and branded content. Which is why Guvera’s branded channel resonates so neatly with Contiki.

“We tend to be at the forefront of a lot of those advertising media revolutions, to a degree. And this is just another step in that direction,” adds Morgan.

While Contiki still uses print as an advertising medium, Morgan says they would never use it as a standalone platform.

“We occasionally do more traditional campaigns,” concedes Morgan, “but we try to really focus on integrated campaign activations.” Such as the launch of Contiki’s new tour around Japan.

Contiki created a pop-up restaurant in Sydney called ‘Robots Unrivalled’, with a Japanese music channel on Guvera, specifically curated for Contiki.

“We seeded this Japan campaign through a JPop track playlist to start with, and then we evolved that into a full ‘Robots Unrivalled’ playlist as we got closer to the event,” explains Morgan.

“There was also a button on the Guvera app which led directly to the ‘Robots Unrivalled’ landing page where you could purchase tickets to the event.”

Aside from campaign integration, the Branded Channel offering for Contiki means users can book tours then and there and don’t have to click out of the app.

“That’s the beauty of it,” says Morgan. “It’s not merely a click off to a website outside of the app. The ability for our brand to integrate within that and also deliver some product that can be browsed or booked is really a fantastic user experience.”

While not disclosing how many tours had been booked direct through the Guvera app, the data Contiki captures is critical as it shows who is looking at what tours.

“Guvera report to us on activity in terms of clicks and engagement with the product,” Morgan said.

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