Section: News

Big Red Group celebrates Auscontact award win

Two Auscontact Association national awards taken home by Big Red Group’s customer experience team

Big Red Group is thrilled to announce that our very own Customer Experience team has taken out the 2022 National Auscontact Association Awards for the Change, Innovation, and Improvements category last Friday.

At a national level, our Customer Experience team was recognised for its depth of talent that had delivered a huge plan of work with a flawless execution, and had achieved record breaking results across its client services and employee engagement. A special mention to the Big Red Group Senior Leadership Team for its continual support and commitment to delivering on quality customer experience.

North Queensland hotels ready to reap partnership benefits

Destination Cairns Marketing joint venture comes to life

Cairns, 1 April 2022 – Big Red Group’s Experience Oz, and Destination Cairns Marketing (DCM) are ready to give the green light today on market execution of its recently formed joint venture (JV).

After months of planning and integration work, following on from announcing agreed terms in February, DCM is ready to roll out the new Local Agent fueled platform to its 130+ hotel partners.

While deployment will be progressive and managed around peak trade of school holidays, hotels in the region are set to benefit over coming months from the more advanced technology.

Under the JV, Big Red Group’s leading domestic holiday brand Experience Oz will generate demand via branded tour desks, while its B2B platform, Experience Oz Local Agent will supply the technology to support activity bookings. Technology enhancements include in-room activity booking via QR codes and lobby booking kiosks.

Matt Cavalier, Chief Growth Officer at Big Red Group who has been heading up the integration work comments:

The focus for the integration has been ensuring our partners and customers continue to experience great service and that the transition to the Experience Oz Local Agent platform is seamless while at the same time providing more experiences in the region and an enhanced booking platform. Training and engagement have been paramount to achieve this, and as partners cut over, they will continue to receive ongoing support from our face-to-face team in Cairns as well as our support team in the Gold Coast 7 days a week.

Sam Ferguson, CEO of the Joint Venture and General Manager Commercial for DCM comments:

“After months in the making, we are excited to launch and bring much needed demand to the region. We have been working so well with Big Red Group’s integration team, streamlining processes and systems to prepare for today’s launch. Conscious that there are high volumes of hotel guests at the moment with school holiday traffic in the area, we will take a slow and steady approach to minimise disruption.”

It is envisaged that the JV will generate significant new demand for the area, and provide a more expansive range of experiences for hotel guests to explore, with a substantial marketing investment planned.

‘Stay and Play’ to inspire interstate and intrastate travel to Gold Coast

Big Red Group’s Experience Oz powers Destination Gold Coast’s ‘Stay & Play’ Campaign

‘Stay & Play’ to inspire interstate traveller’s to the Gold Coast, providing significant boost to tourism sector
Gold Coast, 23 March 2022 – Big Red Group’s leading domestic experience provider Experience Oz, and its hotel concierge booking arm Experience Oz Local Agent will partner with Destination Gold Coast (DGC) to deliver the ‘Stay & Play’ campaign, aimed at boosting the Gold Coast’s accommodation, tour and experience sector.

This interstate marketing activity was made possible after the campaign received grant funding, via Destination Gold Coast, from the Australian Government under the Recovery for Regional Tourism program, an initiative of the $1 billion Covid-19 Relief and Recovery Fund.

The ‘Stay & Play’ campaign will incentivise interstate visitors with a complimentary $200 or $400 experience bonus (per accommodation booking) on select 3 to 5 night or 6+night Gold Coast stays during off-peak and shoulder seasons through until 30 October 2022.

Patricia O’Callaghan, CEO Destination Gold Coast comments:

“With interstate borders now fully open, Stay & Play gives interstate holidaymakers the chance to come and explore our breadth and depth of Gold Coast experiences. Whether you love adrenaline activities, natural or cultural attractions, the Gold Coast has got it all!”

“Stay & Play is expected to generate more than 27,000 room nights, but importantly will support the recovery of our industry to fill our tours, attractions and experiences.”

Experience Oz Local Agent will facilitate the program, with visitors able to redeem their experience bonuses at participating properties and their concierge booking desks. Experiences will be provided by Experience Oz suppliers in the region, who will welcome the increase in demand.

David Anderson, CEO and Co-founder of Big Red Group comments:

“We are thrilled that Experience Oz and Experience Oz Local Agent can support DGC in executing this campaign. We anticipate this will generate significant demand into the Gold Coast’s tourism sector which has suffered significant losses over the past two years. In particular, it will bring much needed support to 150+ tour and experience businesses who partner with Experience Oz, and the local properties involved in the program who currently work with Experience Oz Local Agent.”

Adrenaline and TEQ Australia Partnership

Adrenaline Partners with Tourism Queensland to Win Intrastate and Interstate Tourism

In March 2022 the Adrenaline x TEQ partnership focused on winning both intrastate and interstate tourism dollars. Aiming to capture momentum around expected relaxed border restrictions and customer confidence increases.

The partnership’s aim was to drive incremental spend on Queensland adventures in-destination & prior to travel through Adrenaline’s easy to use live-availability booking functionality.

All campaign content promoted distinctly Queensland experiences to owned, earned & paid audiences across NSW, VIC & QLD driving incremental interstate and intrastate adventure travel.

The campaign also Instilled confidence in customers to book travel now with Adrenaline’s 5-year validity, free exchanges, and unlimited rescheduling.