Say goodbye to the Trivago girl! Check out the company’s new campaign

Say goodbye to the Trivago girl! Check out the company’s new campaign

Move over, Trivago Girl, because there’s a new ad in town.

That’s right – if you loved the company’s trademark woman, we may have some bad news.

The much-loved ad was replaced earlier this week with a new, more modern campaign – which is more in tune with Trivago’s new “all-encompassing” visualisation.

To get the scoop on exactly what this new campaign means to Trivago, we spoke to Diana Vidovic, regional manager for Trivago, who said that whilst Trivago Girl isn’t gone for good just yet, she’s taking a hiatus.

“Trivago Girl, played by Australian Gabrielle Miller, has been phenomenally successful in building brand awareness and encouraging travellers to visit our website so that they can compare the different hotels on offer.

“However, over the last year we have been moving towards a more holistic approach focusing on the complete travel experience, rather than just price comparison, and these new ads have pre-tested highly for audience engagement,” she told TW.

The old campaign proved very popular among Aussies and the rest of the world, but Vidovic said the instructional video may have run its course in Australia.

“As opposed to Trivago Girl which is very instructional, come to the website, pick your dates, and here’s the price, the new ad is more inspirational right now and focused on a destination as opposed to just how to use the website,” she said.

“One of the things that we’ve seen is that Australians, rather than just wanting to be a tourist abroad or overseas, they’re wanting to be a part of the experience. We’ve seen that many travellers are not only price sensitive, it’s really more about finding your ideal hotel but also gaining all the benefits around it,” she said.

According to Phocuswright research, four out of five people participate in a tour, activity, ticketed event or attraction during their trip and two out of five people research these before they book their flights or accommodation.

Which is exactly why Trivago’s new ad is all about the experience.

“You’ve decided where you want to travel to, you’ve made a decision and now need a hotel,” she said.

“Whereas now, the new campaign is very inspirational at the beginning.”

The campaign, set in Thailand, was produced by Johnathon Laing, a kiwi who works in Trivago’s creative production team in Dusseldorf.

“When he first showed me the draft and I was listening to is and I was like ‘oh this guy’s voice is amazing we should totally have his voice in the spot’. So I contacted Johnathan because I thought that it would fit the Australian market,” Vidovic explained.

The new campaign highlights Trivago’s filters – not just the obvious ones like free wifi, air conditioning, close to beach, or swimming pool – but also by typing in features like ‘sailing’, ‘hiking trail,’ ‘honeymoon,’ or even ‘party people’, which have been made more prominent on the website.

Trivago has also introduced accommodation options from holiday home website Stayz,

“In the past we were focused on just mainly comparing hotels but now another way that we’re trying to be more all-encompassing is by including other alternative accommodation partners,” Vidovic said.

And whilst Trivago has only partnered with HomeAway (who recently bought out Stayz) for now, Vidovic said that the company is “very open” to partnering with Airbnb in the future too.

“If you want to search for different types of accommodation like a serviced apartment, holiday home, then you can also make it available in the search because we’ve also seen that what is the definition of a hotel anymore has become so broad,” she said.

Including other forms of accommodation is all part of Trivago’s mission to be all-encompassing, which Vidovic said will help position the company as “travel experts” in the industry.

“In the past we were more of a hotel expert, and we were advising our consumers on the best way to use a website to get the hotel that they want. Whereas now it’ll kind of flip us around to the front.

“Say someone is thinking of going on a holiday next weekend, if they want more inspiration they can go to Trivago and start searching and thinking of ideas about where is the best place to stay.

“We also have another product called the Trivago Magazine, and this is our blog. On here we feature a lot of different boutique hotels, like really unique things like the Hello Kitty hotel in Japan. So this is another area where we are trying to position ourselves more as a travel expert,” Vidovic said.

Watch this space, though, because Trivago Girl isn’t gone forever yet.

“We’re seeing people using metasearches to find other factors like wanting to find the best experience they can get. So that was the main reason for the shift,” Vidovic said.

“That doesn’t mean the Trivago Girl is gone. We are always testing different options.”

Email the Travel Weekly team at traveldesk@travelweekly.com.au

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