CHALLENGE

The Ardross Property Group is one of WA’s most enduring and successful private property developers and was seeking help to promote land sales for its Beachridge Estate in Jurien Bay.

After an initial surge in sales, consistent with a trend across the broader property market in WA, demand had receded and the company was looking at a marketing strategy to build the estate’s brand awareness.  Our initial investigation and analysis indicated that, while the Estate offered great value to potential buyers, there was a deeper underlying problem to be solved first in order to lift prospective buyer interest.  To put it bluntly, before we could drive successful marketing outcomes for Beachridge Estate, we needed to lift brand awareness of Jurien Bay itself.

Jurien Bay was suffering a chronic case of “out of sight, out of mind” but also fundamentally lacked any clear way to differentiate itself as a desirable alternative to other beachside communities such as Dunsborough, Margaret River or Kalbarri.

In a nutshell the great challenge was to identify, articulate and communicate a value proposition for Jurien Bay that was credible, deliverable and able to inspire hearts and minds.

SOLUTION

From the outset we focused on two key pillars of thinking within brand marketing.  Firstly, any promotion of a brand must be able to walk the talk.  It was pointless to create a campaign that painted Jurien in a way that was not consistent with the real experience people had when they went to the town.  Secondly, we know that the value proposition used in any marketing campaign needs to focus on a clear point of difference.  There was no point in just running a publicity campaign up against the big guns with high awareness like Margaret River with its wine, food and surf culture so well recognised even beyond WA.  We needed to position Jurien Bay as something unique but also desirable.

A critical first step was to be clear on the key question:  1. What did Jurien Bay have that was truly unique and what audience was likely to be most responsive to this point of difference?  It was equally important to have brutal honesty, which is where the key breakthrough came in creating the campaign idea.  The fact of the matter was that Jurien Bay had not changed much since the 1960s – it didn’t have the full suite of entertainment options for families with children or the wineries and restaurants for adults seeking to indulge themselves for a special weekend away.

This led to the development of the strategy based around the key insight that there was a segment of consumers who actually don’t want what the glamour locations down south offer them… which come with traffic jams, queues of people and trendy culture.  More to the point, this segment were also the people most likely to be in the market for a beachside holiday home or retirement location.  What this segment wanted was actually the very opposite of Dunsborough and Margaret River’s hustle and bustle.

We created Jurien Bay Time, a campaign designed to remind our target audience of places like Dunsborough before they became trendy and crowded.  We positioned Jurien Bay as representing a form of “Return to the Future’, harking back to the holidays our target audience fondly remembered from when they were kids.  A simpler time when mum and dad threw the kids into the back of the hardy Holden station wagon, along with the tent, the dog and a few bikes.  A time when Saturday night dinners came from the local Fish ‘n’ Chip Shop, when kids didn’t need video games but read books and would disappear at sun up to head down the beach on their bikes – a beach characterised by plenty of space and fresh air.

Part of the campaign execution was the brand idea of Jurien Bay Time – a mental time machine that involved sharing stories, memories and rekindling that longing for a simpler time.  The campaign messaging included ‘online’ meaning a dad teaching his kids to fish, ‘facebook’ meaning falling asleep with a book over your sunglasses and a ‘traffic jam’ in Jurien Bay meaning a couple of bikes and a campervan. 

The campaign was perfect for social platforms like Facebook because it enabled us to engage audiences, encouraging both responses and sharing.  It also allowed us to invite people to share their personal memories of the good old fashioned West Aussie beach holiday, to post their old photographs and share their stories.

OUTCOME

The campaign was extremely successful in engaging with its 55+ target group driving nearly 5,000 likes/followers on Facebook in just eight months. The campaign attracted statewide media attention including stories, an Alston cartoon in the West Australian and interviews on radio from journalists curious about the town bold enough to wear its old fashioned lack of sophistication as a badge of honour.  The campaign also won a number of awards in recognition of its unique creative approach and execution.