Estonian Convention Bureau’s “Go Wild, Choose Estonia!” is a creative storytelling destination marketing campaign from a small convention bureau, aimed to create a national brand image and maximise return-on-investment with a limited marketing budget.
The main challenge Estonia had to solve is that, as a country, they are still relatively unfamiliar to international audiences. To build an image for themselves, most convention bureaus take advantage of brand identities created by their national tourist boards; however, Estonia does not have a relevant national brand image with which it could work. To overcome this and raise awareness and visibility of the destination and generate business requests for the convention bureau and its members, Estonia Convention Bureau created its own brand image on a very limited marketing budget. By proactively communicating authentic and unique experiences that can be enjoyed in Estonia, they focused on creating and curating engaging content.
Congratulations also go out to the other two finalists: International Convention Centre Sydney (ICC Sydney), for their “It’s Showtime!” campaign, and Convention Bureau Italia for their “Italy at Hand” campaign.
“Estonia Convention Bureau demonstrated the power of storytelling told in a passionate and personal and committed way. It shows that a great marketing campaign is not restricted by the amount of budget, but thrives on creativity, passion and commitment, and clever execution. These challenges and the creative way in which they were addressed resonated strongly with the ICCA Congress delegates in the room and the judging panel.”
Riine Tiigi and Kadri Karu of the Estonian Convention Bureau said: “Wow, what an achievement! We have really worked hard for this. For our destination, it gives huge visibility. It really puts us on the map. Estonia is such a small destination and our team is only 3 people, so it is hard to get noticed. I think we got noticed now. We really feel like we have won the Oscars for the international meetings industry!”
