NZdronie
Tourism New Zealand
Issue 34 | March 2015
Agency
Whybin\TBWA Sydney
Creative Team
Creative Avish Gordhan Mandie van der Merwe
Production Team
Drone Op Tony Young Event/ Production Company Engage NZ Company Director Craig Ciurlionis Event Manager AJ Lui Ops Manager Biana Tofilau
Other Credits
Other Katherine Butterworth Sean Gardner David Valderrama Razif Djamaluddin Beau Silvester Pete Galmes Matty Burton Dave Bowman Russ Tucker Claire Verlander Fiona Milliken Rob Lowe Candice Juniper Erin Kelly
Date
July 2014
Background
New Zealand was a beautiful country. And the best advertisement for this beauty was the tourists who visited the place. Tourism New Zealand needed an idea that would get visitors to show off the beauty of New Zealand in an easy, shareable way.
Idea
When people took selfies, the problem was the photo was almost always of a face with very little of the landscape included. So Tourism New Zealand created a
new way people could take selfies with lots and lots of New Zealand in the background.
They called it NZdronie, the first drone-operated selfie service anywhere.
Operated by an independent drone pilot up on the ski slopes of South Island, Dronie took eight-second videos of skiers and snowboarders. First it came in close before backing away 50 metres or so for a wide shot. The files were then beamed to the person's mobile using AirDrop.
Once the selfie had been captured, the photos were automatically watermarked so they could be shared easily.
The best selfies were awarded prizes.
Results
Total Reach: 34,000,000.
Total Earned Media Value: AUD 1,893,653.
ROI: 1400% (Every $1 spent got a return of $14.22 in earned media).
Our Thoughts
We’ve seen drones used by Domino’s, claiming to be testing a faster pizza delivery service http://youtu.be/-CYT4PFV_Hs and drones helped create great content for Fendi at their 2014 fashion show in Paris http://youtu.be/GsOzdoBLuf8 so there is a trend happening here.
In truth, only a tiny handful of people will ever get to have a dronie taken of them but the novelty of the idea is what people are talking about and sharing. Little ideas can get surprisingly big if they catch the imagination like this.