In early 2017, GoPro's consumer insights team presented compelling data indicating significant opportunity for growth in the travel space among existing GoPro owners and prospect audiences. While we've always known that GoPro users have an appetite for travel, the new data revealed untapped potential for reaching new audiences globally who travel regularly for leisure. Additionally, the data indicated that travel content is consumed twice as much as any other vertical on GoPro-owned channels, meaning the appetite for viewing travel is strong as the desire to travel.

This data informed a multi-year marketing strategy designed to position GoPro as an essential tool of travel storytelling, tapping consumers' desire to travel, explore, discover and grow in order to build GoPro awareness and generate product demand. The objectives of this strategy were to:

create global campaigns that would reach a travel audience and inspire them to purchase

incorporate aspirational yet approachable content that feels inclusive to broad audiences

identify opportunities to showcase the camera and its capabilities in a unique, authentic way

grow total addressable market through localized initiatives and content

develop initiatives that reach consumers throughout the travel lifecycle, from the dream, research and booking phases to planning, experiencing and sharing

With these objectives in mind – and the overarching goal of making GoPro an essential tool of travel storytelling - we embarked on a search for partnerships and integrations.

In April 2017, GoPro began discussions with Lonely Planet, the world's leading provider of travel content and inspiration, about an integration with their Best in Travel 2018 campaign, an annual list of the best countries, cities, regions and value destinations. From the first meeting it was clear that GoPro and Lonely Planet had similar goals – to move far beyond a traditional ad-spend "formula" of banner ads and pre-rolls and develop surprising and authentic ways to integrate GoPro into the development of the entire Best in Travel 2018 campaign.

For GoPro, we knew Lonely Planet had the platform to be a powerful partner as we developed our marketing strategy to position GoPro as an essential tool of travel storytelling. With a global network, Lonely Planet provides content in multiple languages on multiple platforms, truly reaching travellers in every corner of the world.

The partnership formed and moved to planning and execution stages very quickly, as Lonely Planet was already well into their selection of its Best In Travel destinations. We outlined several key features for the integration of GoPro's HERO6 camera into the production shoots:

• GoPro cameras and accessories would be the primary capture device used on the production shoots for the winning destinations across the four 'Best In Travel' categories - top cities, top regions, top countries and top values
  • GoPro provided each production team with extensive training on our products including HERO6, Karma Drone and Karma Grip stabilizer
  • GoPro and Lonely Planet collaborated on shoot itinerary, customizing each production team's toolkit to include the best mounts and accessories for the destination and shot list.
  • Lonely Planet staggered the shoots to allow GoPro to provide feedback and revisions along the way. As each shoot progressed, the production teams became more proficient at shooting with GoPro tools and the shoots became more efficient overall
• GoPro would send a local advocate (social influencer who is also a GoPro content creator) to each of the 4 shoots to provide local/insider perspective and shoot additional content for their personal channels and for GoPro's channels and future campaigns
  • We identified individuals who are part of the GoPro advocacy programs and are also talented at using GoPros to capture content, particularly related to travel
  • GoPro provided creative direction, shot list and list of specific deliverables (i.e. – 60-second spots, behind-the-scenes IG stories, educational content, product in use photos) for advocates to post on their channels and provide to GoPro for real-time posting and future campaign use
  • On-location production team integrated GoPro advocate into each shoot
  • Resulting content was added to our catalog of regionalized photos and videos that help support our localized social media and marketing strategies
• GoPro creative team had final approval of all Lonely Planet-created GoPro content for the Best In Travel 2018 campaign and would shared ownership of the raw content for use in future advertising, packaging, marketing campaigns, etc.

The Best in Travel 2018 integrated campaign exceeded both GoPro's and Lonely Planet's expectations in reach, views and impressions globally. At the completion of the campaign, Lonely Planet created 22 videos showcasing GoPro devices and technology in the countries of Chile, Spain, Ireland and Estonia, resulting in 64 minutes of total footage. Videos included point-of-view footage from our cameras as well as product in use (i.e. – someone riding a bike with a GoPro on the handlebar, etc.). A few additional performance stats include:

• 13+ million video views across all social channels and Lonely Planet website
• 75.3M impressions for total campaign
• 40M+ impressions for social campaign
• 2:31 – average time spent viewing GoPro video content

The initiative also blew doors off of Lonely Planet's previous 'Best in Travel' Campaign (with a non-competing technology brand). Year over year comparison stats include:

• 279% growth in video views (10.1M v. 2.6M)
• 346% growth in social media impressions (39.4M v. 8.8M)
• 74% increase in average session duration (# of minutes spent engaging with content)

The GoPro team was thrilled with the results of the Lonely Planet partnership, it helped achieve each of our set objectives and goals: the campaign was global in scale and directly targeted a travel audience; showcased the camera and its capabilities in a unique and authentic way; integrated localized content; reached consumers in all phases of the travel lifecycle.