Declaring that Travel Should Take You Places, Hilton Hotels’ newly-launched advertising campaign is already taking home honors from design industry critics.After launching in the United States, Canada and Mexico on January 15, the campaign’s television spots and online component, hiltonjourneys.com, are being recognized for both their creativity and design.
Television and Web ads, designed by Young & Rubicam, Irvine, Calif., revolve around the theme, “Travel is more than just A to B. Travel should take you places.” The campaign refers to the importance of each guest’s journey and the power of travel to awaken the mind, spirit and senses.
“Dancing Couple” and “Sunrise,” two of four television spots created for the campaign, earned recognition on Advertising Age’s AdCritic.com, an industry Website known for highlighting originality in advertising. These 30-second spots were honored as two of AdCritic’s top ten television advertisements during the week of the campaign’s launch. Advertising Age’s February 6 issue also ranks “Sunrise” number eight in their Top Spots ranking, based on a survey conducted through IAG Research that tracks likeability scores for all of January’s new TV ads.
“We are truly honored and appreciate all of the recognition the Hilton campaign has received,” said Jeff Diskin, senior vice president of Hilton Brand Performance. “It reflects our company’s philosophy and embodies a concept we live everyday and we are so glad that it has been so well received.”
The recurring imagery in the ads depicts a line drawn between Point A and Point B that morphs into a drawing reflecting guest experiences while staying at Hilton hotels, reinforcing the message that travel is about the journey, not just the destination. To bring the campaign to life, Hilton has licensed songs from hot, young artists, including “Life is Wonderful” by Jason Mraz, “High” by James Blunt, “Landed” by Ben Folds, “Nice Day” by Persephone’s Bees, and “Wanna Fly” by Vassy.
Hiltonjourneys.com, the online element of the new Hilton campaign, has also received international accolades from two sites honoring the best in creative content on the Internet. Favorite Website Awards named hiltonjourneys.com its “Site of the Day” on January 27. Judging criteria established by FWA evaluates sites in five areas: design, navigation, graphics, content and personality. The Hilton site is also a contender for FWA’s “Site of the Month” award and a potential contender for the site’s “People’s Choice Award,” which is chosen by an international public vote of FWA site users.
Brazil’s Style Awards named hiltonjourneys.com one of its 30 finalists for January. A team of advertising professionals selects finalists for their use of design, navigation, continuity, originality and sound. Monthly winners are selected by an online vote of visitors to www.styleawards.com.
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