Let's make memories...
Marketing Campaign Information - from Tom Outing, North York Moors National Park
Creating special moments for our visitors
Let’s make memories… is a campaign designed to inspire domestic visitors – primarily based within a 2-hour drive time of the National Park - to create or re-create memories to help with the ongoing pressures of everyday life. Positive memories and anticipation can support wellbeing, a key theme in the North York Moors Management Plan. When visitors are here, we need to showcase all we can offer.
Key campaign objectives
- Support businesses and footfall to the National Park during ‘off peak’ seasons
- Inspire family and millennial visitors to experience the area for the first time, as well as encouraging existing visitors, such as grand-parents to re-create important family moments
- Raise awareness of the North York Moors National Park in neighbouring regions with focused marketing activity and spend in the Northeast, Yorkshire and Humber, letting people know about the green space on their doorstep and showing how accessible it is
- Promote businesses and activities to showcase the value of a day visit or stay
- To convey a sense of ‘real’ in all marketing activities, with real visitor feedback and their stories, and to highlight the people who make the North York Moors from bakers to glassmakers.
Key messages
Here are some examples of key messages that will be used throughout the campaign. They are not straplines but just some prompts for your own marketing. 
- Discover a new place on your doorstep.
- Try something new with a growing network of accessible routes and activities that don’t require previous experience.
- Create memories with your friends and family.
- Income should not be a barrier to visiting the North York Moors. There are plenty of ways to enjoy free activities as well as luxury options.
- Inspire people to take a piece of the National Park away with them - locally made gifts or produce.
- Encourage visitors to look after themselves, and the landscape
- Stay local when visiting. Walk, cycle, bus or train to your next activity and leave the car behind once you arrive.
Target markets
Within the 2-hour drive time from the National Park we will be focussing on two key markets. We aim to attract new visitors and nurture repeat visitors.
Families (Activity targeted to Male and Females 30-40 & 65+)
We hope to give them a great introduction to the area, creating memories to last a lifetime and inspire the next generation. Grandparents can help, acting as advovates.
Parents and children may be looking for:
- days out and fun activities to stay busy.
- ease of booking and access to the National Park's offering. They don’t have time for extensive research.
- peer-to-peer recommendations and reviews, whether on social media or in the school playground. We need to showcase that we are a trusted family location.
- ideas for value-for-money trips. Activities with longer dwell time often feature, even if they cost a little more.
- Accessibility. Can they take a pushchair into a café or heritage site? Do we offer a children’s menu? Is the walk doable for an 8-year-old?
Grandparents may be looking for:
- opportunities to re-create memories, and introduce places to their grandchildren.
- gifts and souvenirs to remember their visit. They may be willing to spend a little more.
- extended stays, with their grandchildren, particularly if they are retired and able to relieve pressures and help parents
Millennial couples (Ages 25-35)
Some of these couples will have recently left education or be in early careers. Older ones may be more settled and perhaps looking for more experiences before starting a family. This is the first of the ‘social media’ generation, who will happily showcase their memories to friends and family.
What they are looking for:
- Escape from everyday working life, to enjoy activities together
- They’ll have a better understanding of nature, wildlife, countryside and climate-change; this audience will feel more educated and be more adapted to nature.
- Cost effectiveness is important, but not the main drive while they have fewer dependents
- Will be more inclined to use accommodation such as glamping, cabins, lodges and options that they feel are special. They enjoy something 'instagrammable’ which is perhaps more distinctive or luxury. Presentation is key to some of this market.
- A greater potential to react and plan/book later so need encouraging throughout the year.
Locations: Yorkshire, Humber and the Northeast
Marketing activity and timeline
Staying local with be a key message. We will use targeted digital marketing. All activity below will be split regionally with the Northeast and Yorkshire/Humber receiving two different adverts.
For example, adverts in Yorkshire will feature such places as Helmsley, Pickering, and the west part of the Cleveland Way, whereas the Northeast will see northern parts of the Cleveland Way and Staithes or Goathland. Audios for Spotify will be in a regional accents for each as we aim to add a sense of local advocacy.
Spring 2023 campaign recap
YouTube adverts (in-feed, while watching, 6-second bumpers prior to main user video)
Google Max repeat marketing (display adverting on enabled sites, google search)
Social Media (Facebook/Instagram – feed, messenger, inbox, stories, reels)
Greatest Hits Radio adverts
Hearts FM evening show sponsorship
Spotify audio/visual adverts
Influencer activity (family)
All across the period of 16 May – 6 July (except Hearts FM Sponsorship which closed 14 August)
Autumn/Winter 2023/24 – upcoming activity
Visual refresh on videos and photography for both. Audio refresh occurred in winter.
All the above +
Cinema advertising (10 November for 3 week run)
On board train digital adverts (2 week run in November)
Greatest Hits radio competition (runs 20 October for 2 weeks)
Across the months of September to end of December unless stated.
How your business can get involved in the Let’s make memories… campaign.
We'd like to give you the opportunity to piggyback on this activity and help amplify its reach. If we all use similar campaign messages, the impact will be much greater for everyone.
Calls to action should drive traffic to the National Park’s new website: northyorkmoors.org.uk/memories. It’s the main hub for information to inspire and encourage potential visitors to plan their perfect break in the North York Moors.
We need your news and ideas
From opening times, new products or features, events and seasonal activities; letting the Marketing team know your plans as soon as possible means you could be included on our website, photography and videos. We’re also seeking feedback and reviews from real visitors to help amplify our storytelling and advocacy. Please send your information to Phoebe Smith p.smith@northyorkmoors.org.uk
How to use our films and images
Videos are the backbone of any digital campaign. They’ll highlight a range of activities and experiences on offer, showcasing the diversity of the North York Moors. We have created social-media-friendly 15sec and 30sec formats as well as 1 min showcase styles.
If you’d like to use shorter films on your social media, we recommend you upload them directly into your feeds after downloading them from the links below. Check out the video folder on ResourceSpace now to download the videos.
You can also share direct from YouTube to your chosen social media account if you wish, though the algorithms are not are strong compared to uploading natively.
We’ve created a series of branded photographic assets for the campaign. Featuring our target markets, they can be used across all your platforms, including websites and social media. Please credit the photographer during use.
The photo should download with the credit and location information in the filename, however we are aware of a glitch which means this isn’t always happening. Please refer to the information under the photo in ResourceSpace for that information.
Click here to go to the ResourceSpace collections.
Social media top tips
Use #LetsMakeMemories on relevant platforms
Tag the North York Moors National Park channels in your posts: @northyorkmoors on Twitter and Instagram and @northyorkmoorsnationalpark on Facebook
Include the link northyorkmoors.org.uk/memories in the thread (not original post) where possible.
Showcase the experiences/ themes on offer and link your offer back to the key campaign messages
Be authentic, show visitors how they’ll benefit and why they will love it
Go one step further
You could even create a new page on your website that focuses on areas you feel will hit the target audiences.
If you send e-newsletters or emails to your marketing database, include links to the Let’s make memories… videos (and even a link back to our website) to show more reasons to visit the North York Moors, or as part of pre-visit welcome emails.
For more information, contact the Marketing Campaigns Manager, Tom Outing at the North York Moors National Park: t.outing@northyorkmoors.org.uk
Evaluation
Phase 1 (Spring)
The launch of the campaign took place in May 2023 driving people to the National Park’s old website. This phase was assigned a third of the paid-for activity, holding back the remainder to support the activity in the Autumn and Winter months.
Highlight figures include:
- Yorkshire radio adverts hit 151,801 people with 95.8% listen completion, Northeast hit 151,781 with 96.5% listen completion.
- Over 160,000 people hit with an advert an average of 4 times each on Spotify.
- Over 170,000 people saw the 4OD adverts.
- 1,260,954 impressions on social media activity. Including 68,000 views at 5p cost-per-view (industry average of 35p so positive ROI here!)
- Google activity had 625,933 views
- All the above drove over 14,000 clicks to the website. For comparison this is an improvement on phase 1 of the previous campaign (Time For You) while spending less money.
- 33% uplift in the Northeast of ‘non-visitors’ [those surveyed who have yet to visit the National Park in their lifetimes] who have now heard of the North York Moors. (compared to post-campaign evaluation of previous campaign)
- ‘How likely or unlikely are you to consider also spending some time in the North York Moors National Park during your next visit to York?’ – Previous four quarters just 6% said Very Likely/Quite Likely, when asked in Q1 of this year figure is now 35%. (Visit York survey)