Tourism Winnipeg recently finished in the top 3 with Oslo and Australia for the prestigious 2024 ICCA Best Marketing Award, and we couldn’t be prouder.
Visit Oslo’s viral, hilarious “Is it even a city” is admittedly one of the best tourism commercials we’ve ever seen. And Tourism Australia, that’s about as big of a DMO fish as you are going to find.
For us, humble, friendly Winnipeg to be a finalist with such prestigious company, well we’ll take it. Although, as you’ll see, our “star-studded” campaign is anything but humble––in fact, it’s quite flash.
Winnipeg+ on the international radar
“This nomination means so much to our organization, particularly when you saw who we were up against,” said Tyler Walsh, Director of Marketing at Economic Development Winnipeg.
“When you consider the many DMOs [destination marketing and management organizations] who have much larger budgets, and who often rely on large advertising firms to create their campaigns, it makes me particularly proud that our little marketing department was able to create a campaign that has made such an impression on the international radar.”
Tourism Winnipeg’s nominated campaign, Winnipeg+, is a spoof of popular television streaming services. The main campaign landing page features “trailers” for “business events programs” that showcase the city’s marquee event spaces––all while introducing event planners and decision makers to Tourism Winnipeg’s staff members and local hotel, attraction and convention centre employees, who often “star” in these productions.
Popular examples include trailers for Selling Winnipeg seasons 1-3 (a send-up of Selling Sunset), which showcased event spaces like the RBC Convention Centre Winnipeg, the Royal Aviation Museum of Western Canada, and WAG-Qaumajuq, all starring our business events managers and director. There’s also The Amazing Space, a parody of The Amazing Race which features teams competing for clues at spots like Club Regent Event Centre; Modern Marvels of Manitoba––a tongue-in-cheek tribute to quasi-historical History Network programs which “explores” the event spaces of the Canadian Museum for Human Rights; and let’s not forget about Venue Hunters International which sees meeting planners trying to decide on local venues like an episode of House Hunters International.
Every video and unique campaign was conceptualized, written and organized in-house by Tourism Winnipeg’s marketing team, while Handcraft Creative filmed, edited and produced all the videos. Our Winnipeg+ campaign partners include the RBC Convention Centre, Club Regent Event Centre, the Canadian Museum for Human Rights and Travel Manitoba.
About the award
Founded in 1963, ICCA is one of the most prominent organizations in the world of international meetings. It also acts as a global community and knowledge hub for the international association and governmental meetings industry.
Every year, the organization hosts its Best Marketing Award which recognizes the outstanding achievements of organizations in their effort to market their destination or product. Previous winners include Tourism New Zealand, London & Partners., and Halifax Convention Centre. Last year, Destination Canada was a finalist.
As a finalist, Tourism Winnipeg’s Winnipeg+ campaign was presented to delegates at the 63rd ICCA Congress in Abu Dhabi, UAE, in the dedicated session for the Best Marketing Award on Monday, October 21.
After each finalist presentation, the ICCA audience decided the winner by voting on the event app with the BMA judging panel voting as well. Oslo was announced the winner on October 23, during a dedicated recognition session.
