Story

The best souvenir from Paris? International awareness.

To provide the HomeAway brand, known in Germany as FeWo-direkt, with a little altitude training we packed our PR travel bags for one of the leading online provider of holiday home rentals – destination Paris. Because it was there that HomeAway gave four families from different countries a unique holiday experience they are sure to remember: Staying overnight on the Eiffel tower!

Strategy & Concept

Please keep looking up: the best way to a first rate holiday

HomeAway was international sponsor and official accommodation partner of the UEFA EURO 2016™, which took place in the capital as well as other French cities. We wanted to use that – but how is it possible to derive maximum international media coverage in the shortest possible time? With a strategic coup: we initiated an action that spectacularly and emotionally transported the values of the brand and at the same time a connection with Paris that is recognised worldwide. Indeed, with an emblematic icon of Paris. That is how the idea arose – directly located on the fan mile – to incorporate a holiday apartment into the Eiffel tower itself: the project #EiffelTowerAllYours was born.

Implementation

Hello Eiffel tower. Bonjour world.

In a global competition four winning families were drawn from over 150,000 entries. Coming from France, UK, USA and Japan the families experienced a world premiere: They spent a night on the Eiffel tower. For the German market Public Link developed a strategic plan of activities that included all phases of the campaign – starting with the competition announcement and the construction of the apartment in the Eiffel tower and concluding with the Eiffel tower apartment opening and further events that took place there.

Et voilà: with over 2,500 media articles in 30 countries on six continents and a generated reach of 2.5 billion (in Germany: 214 media articles and generated reach of 98 million) the #EiffelTowerAllYours campaign was the most successful PR campaign for HomeAway to date. Upshot: increase of brand awareness in all markets in which the campaign was conducted, on average a boost of 6 percentage points.

Not only the client found this a resounding success – there were also award nominations: in Germany for the PR Report Award 2017 in the “International Communications” category and for the DPRG international German PR awards 2018 in the “Production and Live Communications” category.

SPREAD THE WORD

“The holiday home provider has made a name for itself with this location, aroused interest and connected the action perfectly with its sponsoring of the European championships. Perfect shot.”
W&V