Brief & destination issues

In 2017, Hurricane IRMA hit the Caribbean, including the Dominican Republic, which was lucky enough to be spared with minimal damage. Following the media coverage of this natural disaster, many people were afraid to travel there. In order to reassure travelers, continue to develop the appeal of its seaside resorts among loyal target groups, and prospect a new category of clientele more attracted by authenticity, discovery and encounters, the Dominican Republic Tourist Board decided to strengthen its digital presence on the French market by developing its social networks and carrying out communication actions with influencers.

The agency’s response and actions taken

Since 2017, Travel-Insight has been supporting the Dominican Republic Tourist Board with its digital communications for the French market. In 6 years, numerous actions have been implemented to raise the profile of the Caribbean pearl, which is now positioned as the number 1 destination in terms of sales among French tour operators.

The agency’s first mission was to take control of the destination’s social networks, which at the time were very underdeveloped, with a presence only on Facebook and Twitter. The aim was to rapidly develop the B2C community, which in 2017 had a strong presence on Facebook, in order to break the destination’s codes and offer trips off the beaten track.

In the wake of Hurricane Irma, Travel-Insight immediately set up an influencer operation to send 3 content creators on location to create content and reassure travelers. 3 leading profiles specialized in travel were selected: Bruno Maltor, Alex Vizeo and Travel Me Happy. The influencers took it in turns to travel around the island for 3 months, showing their communities the different facets of the Dominican Republic. Each trip was tailor-made to suit each influencer’s audience, as well as their preferred themes, so as to cover all the island’s regions and tourist offerings (beach, luxury, nature, adventure, culture, gastronomy…). This operation reached more than 2 million people in 3 months, and provided unique content with more than 15 videos broadcast on the social networks of the influencers and the tourist office, blog articles and numerous photo posts to promote the destination.

Following on from this operation, the agency wanted to go one step further by organizing, alongside Bruno Maltor, a special Dominican Republic “Le Verre du Voyageur” event. As soon as he returned from his trip, Bruno Maltor’s community gathered in Paris at a dedicated venue for the evening to share their experiences and discoveries. Over 1,000 people took part in this evening in the island’s colors, in partnership with XL Airways and tour operator Vivez Les Iles. The agency’s art department designed a special POP for the event, including a photocall to take home souvenir photos and goodies, as well as a competition integrated into the photocall to win the same trip as Bruno Maltor.

Building on the success of this first influencer operation, we repeated the operations with content creators to continue developing tourism on the island. In all, more than 70 French influencers joined us to discover the Dominican Republic and its various regions through blogtrips and one-shot operations. A great deal of work has gone into developing the wilderness region of Samana, and this peninsula in the north of the island is now in second place after Punta Cana.

These ongoing influence operations have enabled the Dominican Republic to constantly renew its content for its social networks, and to change its image as a seaside destination around Punta Cana by becoming the number 1 Caribbean destination for all tastes and targets.

In parallel with its operations, the agency has developed the Dominican Republic’s social networks over the years, creating an Instagram account, a Linkedin page and, more recently, a TikTok account in addition to the existing Facebook and Twitter accounts. Each month, Travel-Insight is responsible for proposing a social media plan for the destination, creating editorial and visual content (photos, videos, motion design), moderating all social networks (responding to comments, private messages, special requests) and managing all social media advertising budgets.

During the Covid-19 crisis, social media communication continued with the implementation of special actions, such as animations to do at home during the confinement, with the aim of always existing in the minds of travelers. In 2022, the Dominican Republic will be the foreign destination on the French market with the best engagement rate on Facebook and TikTok.