Video Postcards for Travel Destinations, Resorts, and Real Estate

Travel Examples

Homebase Abroad

Kiawah Resort

Laughlin, NV

Oceania Cruises

Luxury Villa Finder

Manitoba

American Safari Cruises

Mazatlan Golf

Celebrity Cruises

LifeAfrica

The PGA Tour Club

El Cid

Homebase Abroad

Rocky Mountaineer

The Tour Club

Travel Examples 1
Travel Examples 2
Travel Examples 3
Travel Examples 4

Homebase Abroad

Flimp Case Study: Travel Marketing

Video Brochures for Destination Properties

Client: Homebase Abroad Luxury Villas

About Homebase Abroad Ltd.

Homebase Abroad is one of the most highly-regarded and experienced luxury villa vacation rental companies with a portfolio of villa estate rental properties available in Europe and the United States. Recognized by Condé Nast Traveler, Travel +Leisure and Departures Magazine, the Homebase Abroad team works closely and personally with guests to help create a memorable, personal and enriching villa vacation experience.

Marketing Objectives

Prior to using FLIMP, Homebase Abroad burned property images and information onto DVDs that would be sent by courier to interested vacationers. This was an expensive, time consuming process that relied on direct mail delivery and did not provide tracking of viewer engagement. Interested customers would not receive their information for 1-2 days and when they did, HBA sales associates did not know if it had been looked at by the recipient without a follow up phone call. In addition, the information couldn't be easily shared by the recipient with others.

Homebase Abroad wanted to replace the expensive DVD's and overnight mailings with high quality web video brochures that were easily edited and could be sent by email or web link instantly to prospects and customers. They also wanted to upgrade their existing website with dynamic audiovisual content without having to redesign and reprogram their website at great expense. Finally, HBA wanted the ability to track and report viewer engagement, response and sharing by individual email address. The owners felt that this shift to web video based property brochures would set them apart from other luxury villa rental companies.

The FLIMP Project

Homebase Abroad contracted with Flimp Media to quickly create self-tracking audiovisual video brochures for each of their more than 50 rental properties. To create the content for each brochure, high quality flash video slideshows were created by Flimp Media at a very low cost using available images and classical music tracks. With the FLIMP platform, the videos were combined with web graphics and copy to create a portfolio of custom branded flash videosites video brochures that automatically track and report viewer behavior and responses.

In addition to sending out individual property brochures by email to interested parties, Homebase Abroad has conducted five video email marketing campaigns using the flimp videosites video brochures to promote their business to both travel agents and travelers interested in villa vacations. "We are constantly building new flimps that represent grouping of our properties under various themes. For example, we created special videosites for Spring Break, Spa Getaways, and Large Group Gatherings," noted Hollister. The FLIMP Platform also enables Homebase Abroad to engage in direct email marketing campaigns. Due to high costs and logistical challenges, Homebase Abroad had done only a limited amount of direct marketing. "By using flimps, we can now send quality video brochures by email on any property quickly and easily the same day, track the usage and have no overnight shipping expenses. Flimp has fundamentally changed how we market our properties."

Video Email Flimp Campaign Results

Five different HBA videosites video brochures were sent by email to various groups of target viewers over a three month period using the email marketing tools available with a FLIMP Account. All viewer engagement, response and viral data was tracked and reported by individual email address in the FLIMP reporting dashboard. In total, 1,986 flimp video emails were sent out in five campaigns between January and March 2008. Of the delivered emails, 1,465 were opened for an email open rate of 73.77%. A total of 861 recipients clicked open and watched the flimp videosite video brochure message, representing and engagement or click thru rate of 58.77%. Of the total viewers, 282 or 32.75% watched their video message to completion. The video messages averaged 1 minute 42 seconds each. Finally, 453 viewers clicked a videosite video brochure response link for a campaign response rate of 52.61%. In terms of viral activity, 52 people or 6.04% of videosite video brochure viewers forwarded the message to a friend from the videosite (vs. from their email). The total videosite viewing time across all five campaigns was 41 hours 26 minutes.

"Interestingly we use the flimps for some of our outbound mass marketing, but our greatest use is in sharing them individually to those who have expressed interested in a specific property or two. It allows us to share a lot of information very easily and effectively. Flimp videosites also enable us to present our content in a way that shows us as being progressive in a crowded marketplace. We can stand out from our competition."

"In the business of luxury travel, we send out a lot of information to a lot of people and, quite often, the information we send is shared with other people. FLIMP provides us the ability to see when somebody is engaging with our communication, how deeply they engage and at what point they decide to share it with others. Knowing this helps us be smarter about how and when to interact with our leads."

Mark Hollister,
Director, Homebase Abroad