Porto Destination Showcase

In an increasingly digital world, human connections and experiences are needed more than ever.

Porto Convention & Visitors Bureau wanted to make sure that all its visitors (or potential visitors) feel a connection with this unique Portuguese destination and learn about all it can offer for physical events.

As such, we were dared to create an inventive digital destination activation that could showcase Porto at the M&I Forum – Wyred World 2020, an industry event broadcasted worldwide. It could not be the standard video or activity, it had to be something more… It had to connect with the audience and make them feel part of the destination.

This is how we turned a digital activation into a living story experience.

Challenge

Porto Convention Bureau wanted to show that this unique city is fully prepared to host digital and hybrid events in a fun and engaging way, without forgetting what the city is great at, welcoming physical events in person.

In our client’s words, “our main objective is to create an activity where we present the destination (Porto) in an interactive, educational, creative way, but also that the participants feel inspired by this new approach to promoting a destination”.

Our first big challenge was to think of something that could both be done online by 1 person or by 170 (the total number of participants).

Our second challenge was how to make Porto standout­ from the crowd so that participants would choose to visit Porto as one of their two choices of optional activity selections.

And because challenges always come in threes, our third challenge was that our activation needed to be one hour long, so we had to ensure that the participants were hooked on our digital content for one whole hour non-stop.

The Solution

Using our proprietary EMEX platform we decided to ditch the “cinema-like” destination video and designed an activation that immersed the viewers through an interactive script.

We produced bespoke video-discovery of Porto with the help of a funny and unique storytelling host that took participants all around the city. He then offered participants the role of director and they could decide how the script would play out.

Participants were given two (pre-filmed) options to decide how the story should unfold. They were also able to interact with the characters by adding their comments and making jokes.

In addition to the choice of the storyline, there were three surprise QR-codes within the video that activated tailormade questions for those who were really paying attention to details. Those who scanned the QR-code and correctly answered the three questions the fastest were rewarded with prizes at the end.

For one whole hour, we told a compelling and engaging story of Porto and creatively showcased many of the amazing venues it has to offer.

“Besides the great conversations with everyone I have met during the meetings and the funny after work games, the city tour of Porto was stunning! I have never seen such a great virtual city tour before and the way you built this interactive experience was amazing! Thank you for that.” – Hosted buyer from Germany

“We received dozens of very positive feedbacks, and we are certain that the impact of this investment has exceeded our expectations by positioning ourselves at a higher level, compared to many other international destinations that we ‘compete’ daily. On behalf of the whole team of Turismo do Porto and Norte- Porto CVB, thank you very much.” – Mariana Sousa, Head of MICE Business at Porto Convention Bureau