The Bermuda Tourism Authority’s strategy to drive visitation to Bermuda in the first quarter — when arrivals and hotel occupancy numbers are traditionally lower — is paying off in confirmed hotel bookings.

The number of reservations made in the 2015 Pink Sale increased 45 per cent when compared with the 2014 Pink Sale, while room nights booked were up 24 per cent year-over-year. Those bookings are estimated to generate $4.2 million in visitor spending for the local economy, an increase of $813,000 over last year.

“Our objective for this promotion and all that we do at the BTA is to generate demand for travel to Bermuda to impact spending on-island,” said Victoria Isley, the BTA’s chief sales and marketing officer. “Every dollar BTA invested in this promotion will result in $16 spent in Bermuda between now and the end of April. We believe that’s a pretty impressive ROI for Bermuda’s economy.”

In partnership with the Bermuda Hotel Association (BHA), the Pink Sale promotion ran in North America and Europe for two weeks, January 14 to 28. The ad placements were in North America and Europe for just 14 days to create a sense of urgency to book and take advantage of 15 Bermuda hotels offering 50 per cent off stays of three nights or more.

“On behalf of the 15 participating hotels, we congratulate the Tourism Authority on accomplishing these strong performance results,” JP Martens, the BHA president, said. “It’s very encouraging to see this kind of growth on the same marketing investment as last year — especially in the room nights booked category.

“At the BHA, we feel very strongly that collaboration is the way to success and the 2015 Pink Sale is proof of that. The Bermuda Hotel Association is looking forward to a continued partnership and more collaboration with the BTA.”

The Pink Sale also ran in January 2014, but this time there were twice the number of web impressions on the same media investment of $250,000.

The consumer engagement was much higher across the board:

• Total advertising impressions doubled

• Total website sessions at gotobermuda.com increased 125 per cent

• Pink Sale webpage sessions increased 202 per cent

• Booking Widget Clicks increased 124 per cent

• Web traffic driven to hotel partner websites from Pink Sale webpage increased 90 per cent

“Seasonal island experiences were also promoted through the sale — from golf and spa to whale watching and Railway trails,” Ms Isley said. “We used the brutal winter in the northeast to our advantage with a customised digital feature that showed the live temperature readings in the consumer’s city alongside the temperature in Bermuda. For example, if the weather was 60F or above in Bermuda and 32F or below in New York or Boston, the online ad showed the real-time weather in both locations and a ‘Book Now’ call to action.

“The metrics we’re seeing show us these geo-targeted, customised placements are part of a winning strategy. We teamed up with JetBlue to help increase the exposure, leveraging dedicated email marketing, homepage and getaways banner images and social media integration. JetBlue reported this year’s performance was up 100 per cent over last year. ”

The campaign proved so successful that some hotels chose to extend their booking period to allow visitors to travel on the Pink Sale beyond April 2015. Those performance numbers were excluded from BTA’s reporting to allow for a more accurate comparison with 2014.