By Michael Butler 19th Mar

Best Western – En Route magazine

In bed with Best Western

Objectives

En Route Australasia is the primary communication piece to Best Western guests. En Route’s aim is to create a rapport with the customer. Its purpose is to inspire, entertain and excite the guest by providing great reads across a number of topics including travel to destinations in Australia, New Zealand and Fiji. The magazine aims to promote Best Western properties within those travel regions and destinations.

We were challenged to find original ways to enliven destinations and find an effective way for Best Western to communicate directly with its guests. The magazine needs to attract existing Best Western customers and encourage them to make the most of the many exciting travel destinations throughout Australia and New Zealand, as well as informing them of the Best Western properties that are in these destinations.

Solutions

Published 3 times per year, En Route Australasia is a 48-page travel and leisure publication packed with articles on great places to go, sights to see and experiences to have around Australia and New Zealand. In addition, it features interest articles on personalities, food, wine, business, sport and family travel. Each issue also features news, events, product and entertainment reviews, and an international travel feature. En Route Australasia’s tone is warm, engaging and easy to read, and the magazine’s content appeals to a wide demographic, from leisure travellers to corporate guests.

Best Western challenges us to find truly original ways of representing each destination, so we are always dreaming up creative angles and imaginative design elements to provide a difference from the average travel publication. This has allowed our team of editors and designers a great deal of creative freedom to carefully nurture and evolve this unique and charismatic title.

Results

Best Western’s success, as a membership organisation, is determined by its members (owners of properties that fall under the Best Western brand). In the annual Membership Satisfaction Survey, members get the opportunity to give feedback on overall performance of Best Western.

In the 2011 Membership Satisfaction Survey members were asked to rate En Route as an initiative that assisted them to promote their business and increase revenue. It improved 10.2% on the 2010 results.

How many, how much?

• 88% of Best Western customers agree or strongly agree that they will continue to read En Route Australasia when they stay in Best Western hotels.
• 92% of Best Western customers agree, or strongly agree that En Route Australasia contains interesting articles, with the same percentage agreeing that it covers a wide range of interesting topics.
• 88% of readers agreed or strongly agreed that they liked the design and layout of En Route Australasia.
• 61% of readers took their copy of En Route Australasia with them when they checked out, and 41 per cent passed their copy on to family or friends, showing that the readership extends to readers besides Best Western customers.
•  85% of Best Western customers agree or strongly agree that they would recommend Best Western to friends or colleagues.

Source: En Route Readership survey, December 2010

Client/reader testimonial

Testimonials from Best Western:

“En Route is one of Best Western’s most important marketing tools. Through En Route we provide an interesting and enjoyable add-on for our guests in Best Western hotels throughout Australia, New Zealand and Fiji. For the company, it’s also our most important tool in promoting Best Western properties – through subtle branding stories, well-written destination pieces and advertising.”

Kimi Anderson, General Manager of Sales and Marketing, Best Western Australasia.

“En Route provides an excellent insight into a broad range of travel destinations. It is a favourite with all staff and management here who enjoy reading it and we actively promote it to our guests to read in all our guest rooms. Personally, I enjoy reading it and it has sparked some of my own vacation ideas, like the article on Tasmania in the last edition.”

Tony Bower, Proprietor, Best Western Townsman Motor Lodge

“En Route is a great addition to our guest rooms. It gives our guests a high-quality and professional-looking publication which they can take away with them. It definitely adds to the guest experience that we are able to offer them. In terms of promoting our property through the magazine, it’s also a very valuable marketing medium for us”.

Alisha Adams, Proprietor, Best Western City Sheridan

Testimonials from advertisers in En Route:

“The Best Western En Route magazine provides a perfect opportunity for Coca-Cola Amatil to connect with its lodging guest and customers.  CCA make every effort to support the travel, accommodation and hospitality industry and advertising in En Route is an important part of our brand communication. En Route is so well balanced, appealing to both the leisure and corporate travel audience, that CCA considers ad spots an ideal fit for many of the brands in our portfolio. CCA will continue to use En Route as an important vehicle to share our news and promote our products.”

Jennifer Lymer, National Business Manager, Coca-Cola Amatil

“Apart from the fact that En Route is a stylish, relevant and informative read, it also  allows us to reach such a large and diverse range of consumers that travel through Australia, whether it’s for business or pleasure.  This fits with the diverse range of products we hold in our portfolio – from Jacobs Creek through to G.H Mumm Champagne.”

Emma Regan, National Account Manager, Pernod Ricard

About the Editor 

Emma Wheaton, En Route Australasia’s bubbly editor, has worked at Edge for three years, and has recently specialised in regional travel and lifestyle publications after editing a stable of cruise publications.