Tourism Campaign of the Week: Passion Made Possible

This instalment of Tourism Campaign of the Week turns to Asia, more specifically Singapore!

Overview:

The city-state of Singapore is often thought of as a pass-through city rather than a tourist destination. Singapore’s tourism board says ‘Passion Made Possible’ aims to challenge this conception. In addition, the campaign aims to bring more businesses to Singapore as it tries to move from an economy centered around investment, to one that is slowly moving towards innovation. 

Launched in August 2017, ‘Passion Made Possible’ includes a revamp of www.visitsingapore.com and a series of videos to be released throughout the campaign period.

These videos include inspiring videos framing Singapore ‘For Foodies’ (see below), ‘For Explorers’, and so on, interviews with Singaporean personalities including chefs, athletes, and more (what they call Passion Ambassadors).

Analysis:

Firstly, The video content is beautifully produced. Visually, the content from this campaign, including the websites and video is great. However, this campaign leaves a lot to be desired. A quick look at the ‘Passion Made Possible’ videos reveals that there is no consistent, core message throughout the campaign.

If the message is to change the outlook of Singapore from a pass-through city to a legitimate tourist destination, it is not clear in its content whatsoever.

From interviewing chefs to locals to their ‘Singapore For …’ series, ‘Passion Made Possible’ offers a generic style of content that we see too often.

Passion Made Possible ad

The website, however, maintains more structure and clarity. As the website puts it – Singapore is “where foodies, explorers, collectors, action seekers, culture shapers, and socializers meet―and new experiences are created every day.”

While the website maintains a higher level of clarity, the message itself feels more like a campaign to attract people to live in Singapore rather than visit. Showing off their Passion Ambassadors takes more of an angle that showcases the lifestyles available in Singapore.

While this is an aim of the campaign (to attract businesses to Singapore), it leaves the tourism aspect rather askew. It seems in this instance, that trying to strafe between two core messages has resulted in a campaign that is somewhat confusing and awkward.

What To Take Away:

While, this campaign is aesthetic and visually appealing, this is not the only component of a successful campaign.

What the ‘Passion Made Possible’ campaign has taught us above all else that an effective campaign must maintain a consistent, core message.

Attempting to put across to very broad messages can prove to be extremely difficult. As we see in this campaign, it has resulted in generic, fragmented content.

All in all, Comms8 gives this campaign a 2.5/5. It should be noted however, that this campaign is still running so we’ll be paying attention.