Overview
In 2024, Mnarani Beach Resort set out to win Best Beach Resort in Kenya and Best Family Resort in Kenya at the World Travel Awards. Facing a complex voting process and limited budget, the goal was clear: activate loyal advocates, drive cost-effective visibility, and secure votes at scale.
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Objective
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Strategic Plan
We executed a targeted, data-driven marketing strategy to enhance engagement and visibility.
Initially, we leveraged our existing customers and advocates by launching personalised email marketing campaigns and influencer-style promotions. This approach encouraged our database to share competition details actively, fostering a sense of community and excitement around our brand.
We also created specific and targeted advertising campaigns across social networks, allowing us to reach defined demographics effectively. We built remarketing and lookalike audiences to optimise our efforts, ensuring our ads were cost-effective and impactful.
Moreover, we adopted a viral sharing strategy, often called social hacking, which enabled us to bypass traditional brand pay gates and significantly amplify our organic reach.
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Strategy Highlights
Email and Advocacy
Advocacy emails were deployed to advocates and loyal customers, generating four primary voting campaign pushes.
Using WhatsApp and website screenshots as proof of voting to claim entry into a prize draw for a free stay, creating concrete evidence of voting completion.
Paid Advertising
Targeted ads across Facebook, Instagram, and Google, using
- Retargeting of previous guests
- Lookalike audiences built from email data and engagement signal
- CPM rates were kept low using optimised interest and custom audiences.
Viral Sharing Tactics
- Sharable links embedded in emails and ads to encourage personal profile sharing.
- The campaign bypassed typical brand pay gates by leveraging customer social circles and tapped into influencer-style PR without added cost.
Results
Key Performance Insight
Mnarani Beach Resort won Kenya’s Leading Family Award
Utilising an advocacy-led digital strategy that achieved an AVE Value of R 465,886. Over four months, this figure significantly surpassed the advertising budget of R12,000 for total ad spend within the same period.
Campaign Sharing Statistics
The campaign bypassed typical brand pay gates by leveraging customer social circles and tapped into influencer-style PR without added cost.
Conclusion
The Mnarani campaign proved that even a smaller advertising budget can drive significant results when amplified by data-driven marketing, genuine brand advocacy, and clever social tactics. The campaign didn’t just get votes — it turned customers into promoters, amplified organic reach, and ultimately won the awards.
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About Mnarani
It’s that certain ‘je ne sais quoi’ you feel the moment you walk through the doors… it’s the unmistakable rhythm that you feel in your hips, and the lively beat you find your feet follow.
