According to SimilarWeb data, almost 70% of unique visitors browse through among the top 100 travel websites on mobile.
Travellers (25 – 34 years old) browse more than six websites for flights, transportation, and accommodations for research before booking their upcoming trips.
As customers rely on credible and comprehensive reviews online, travel brands invest in affiliate marketing to expand their reach with potential affiliate partners & customers and increase leads & sales on their websites.
Let’s look at how Involve Asia ran the “Passport to Paradise” campaign that led to future business growth thanks to increased participation by Involve Partners.
Situation
Based on our internal data, travel brands had the highest total sales of close to MYR 350 million compared to other verticals throughout the first three quarters of 2023.
The recent e-Conomy SEA for Travel report stated that over 50% of the top travel search volumes in Vietnam, Malaysia, and Singapore are for Southeast Asian destinations. In contrast, other travel search volumes are visitors looking for Australia, Japan, India, and the United States.
Involve Asia launched the “Passport to Paradise” campaign to meet the demand for making travel plans for the peak seasons of year-end and festive holidays.
The “Passport to Paradise” campaign ran from 2 October 2023 to 30 November 2023 to fulfil these objectives:
- Increase sales from bookings made at travel brands’ websites
- Increase the number of participating travel brands to meet the demand from Involve Partners looking to promote travel brands and tourism offers
- Increase the number of qualified new sign-ups at Involve Asia and in promoting offers from
- Increase Involve Partners’ participation in promoting participating travel brands
Solution
Running Passport to Paradise
Providing Brand Sponsorship
Sponsored travel brands allocated budgets and free gifts for their chosen tier packages of dedicated marketing collaterals to increase brand exposure and attract more Partners to participate in the “Passport to Paradise” campaign.
Involve Asia provided sponsored marketing exposures and prizes for this campaign.
Throughout the two-month campaign, the above dedicated marketing collaterals for sponsored brands were arranged to be sent out to Involve Partners promoting travel brands by country.
Pop-up and dashboard banners highlighted upsized commissions, exclusively for “Passport to Paradise”.
Besides upsized commissions, Involve Partners also received dedicated sponsored brand emails, including limited-time deals and products to recommend to their followers to earn more commissions with bonus rewards.
Campaign Overview
Involve Asia’s “Passport to Paradise” campaign encouraged New & Existing Partners to promote participating travel brands’ deals and earn commissions with exclusive bonus rewards. Selected Partners were in the running to win additional rewards from one of the participating travel brands.
The following types of Partners were given bonus rewards by tier based on specific criteria:
- All Partners (Signed up before 2 October 2023): Pending payouts (MYR50 and above) from promoting and getting successful bookings from a minimum of five participating travel brands
- New Partners (Signed up after 2 October 2023): Minimum of 10 conversions across all participating travel brands
Dedicated Landing Page
We created two landing pages (New Partners & All Partners) where Involve Partners got the following detailed information about “Passport to Paradise”:
- Campaign mechanics
- Bonus rewards table for New Partners & All Partners
- Participating travel brands’ deals
- Blog articles
- Terms & conditions
The landing pages were localised based on the Involve Partner’s country and platform country traffic across regions.
Using Digital Ads to Acquire New Partners
Involve Asia set up the following digital ads on Facebook, Instagram, and Google based on specific objectives and target audiences:
We ran the ads with a compilation of static images & videos with mentions about the limited-time bonus rewards and featured brands.
- Product Catalogue (Carousel)
- Single Static Image
- Video
These digital ads were set to the following target audiences:
Results
Campaign Performance
In comparison with target metric, the consistent communications at various channels led to a 109% increase for the number of Partners getting conversions from promoting participating travel brands.
45.9% of Partners promoting were Partners who already promoted Travel brands. 54.1% of Partners promoting are New Partners, winback Existing Partners, and those who did not promote Travel brands before.
50.7% of the total participating Partners with conversions consisted of Partners who have promoted Travel brands before. New Partners and those who have not promoted Travel brands were the most active in promoting and earning conversions.
37.1% of Partners participated and had conversions were Social who promoted travel brands with exclusive deals and products on engaging social media platforms, using a compilation of images and videos that resonated with the interest of travelling to popular destinations.
Paid Traffic and Sub-Network contributed the highest sales throughout the campaign period due to targeted display ads across various platforms in regions.
Sponsored Brands Performance
The above sponsored brands garnered huge growth in conversions and sales compared to the target.
Involve Partners preferred to promote those sponsored brands due to the following reasons:
- Brand resonance with customers’ preferences for activities and accommodations
- Curated deals for activities & tours at popular destinations
- Recommended hotels at nearby sightseeing destinations
- Exclusive promo codes on the brands’ website and mobile app
The overview of the sponsored brands’ performance gave travel brands further insights that could help them optimise their upcoming campaigns based on their target audience behaviour and preferences for deals and products.
Interested to be part of Involve Asia’s future campaigns? Sign up as Brand and we will contact you to discuss further how we can help fulfil your business growth with affiliate marketing.
