• by Tanya Gazdik , March 15, 2011

Hilton Worldwide is launching a $25 million global rebranding initiative today for its HHonors loyalty program.

The ad campaign, the first work for the brand from Publicis New York, aims to capture the unforgettable experiences people have while traveling, rather than focusing solely on the destination or earning points, says Jeff Diskin, senior vice president, global customer marketing, Hilton Worldwide.

Creative is built on the platform "Hilton HHonors, A World of Experiences Worth Sharing" and is a departure from the "sea of sameness" that consumers are accustomed to seeing in travel and loyalty program advertising, Diskin tells Marketing Daily.

"We recognize that people don't just wake up and decide to travel for that day, it's always an important occasion, whether they are looking to get away with a significant other, or family or shape the course of their business," Diskin says. "It was those sorts of things that enabled us to think about how to reconfigure not just what our loyalty program offers, but really change the vocabulary around the dialogue that we have with travelers."

The executions are heavily dependent on intimate photography, he says. "It's like your own photography that you'd be sharing on your own Facebook page -- if you had a professional photographer shooting it," he says. "It captures those kind of moments between couples and parents and children and work colleagues, all the different ways that people are interacting in their hotels with these great experiences, but doing so in such a way that it's romantic, it's intimate, it's definitely something that stands out. But also interjecting our own sense of fun and flair and humor in the course of copywriting."

One execution features a photograph shot at an unexpected angle, from the visual perspective of a person parasailing. A headline and copy block scan more like editorial than ad copy, and features the headline: "Take more photos that scream vacation." The 10 Hilton hotel brands are featured across the bottom of the two-page ad.

Other executions show interior shots of the hotel, but aren't the typical pristine "beauty shots." In one, a little boy and his father share the double sinks and mirrors in a bathroom. The adult male is shaving while the child lathers his face with shaving lotion. The headline reads: "The best souvenir is the time you spend together."

The campaign includes online, print and outdoor. Broadcast executions are in the works and will roll out in select markets in Europe and possibly the Asia-Pacific region, Diskin says. Customers began to get a glimpse of the new creative direction on recently issued membership cards, he adds.

Hilton HHonors, which covers Hilton Worldwide's 10 distinct hotel brands, has grown in recent years. Total membership is currently at 27 million members, of which more than 2.5 million joined in 2010 alone.

The new loyalty program branding and advertising are part of a continued Hilton Worldwide effort to further unite the company and be seen as one global brand to travelers around the world. Along with the U.S., ads will appear globally in global markets including Turkey, China, the United Kingdom and Italy.