ASIA-PACIFIC – NEW ZEALAND, JULY 3, 2013 – Visitors to New Zealand can now access information about tourism experiences on the go via Tourism New Zealand’s (TNZ) new iOS mobile app, designed and developed in collaboration with Whybin\TBWA’s Digital Arts Network (DAN).
Essential New Zealand is a vital extension to the TNZ digital ecosystem as it continues the newzealand.com journey to an in-country experience.
“This was about helping Tourism New Zealand to maintain a relationship with visitors throughout all stages of their travel lifecycle," said DAN managing director Che Tamahori, "from dreaming through to experiencing and sharing their New Zealand stories – to maximize the value of international visitors to the New Zealand economy."
“We have an amazing history with TNZ, having worked with them for over a decade. A high level of trust and a fully integrated team across client, agency and app developer allowed us to turn insightful user research into a deceptively simple, focused and gorgeous app.”
He highlights that user research and a focus on user goals was at the core of the app development process, as with any project undertaken by DAN.
“Interviews and testing with visitors to New Zealand were instrumental to the creation of the app, allowing us to gather an intimate understanding of visitors’ in-country planning processes and smartphone usage.”
The research formed the basis of the app, which is focused on specific consumer scenarios and points in the travel lifecycle. The app also implements a ‘create once, publish everywhere’ content strategy, leveraging TNZ’s investment in newzealand.com and its underlying syndication strategy. This means that the app is updated seamlessly and content is consistent across all of Tourism New Zealand’s channels.
“Importantly, all the content in the app, including tourism operator listings and images are efficiently bundled with the app on download. This ensures visitors can use the app anywhere, anytime and without concern for expensive data roaming costs,” says Tamahori.
TNZ brand general manager Catherine Bates says, “We are confident that the Essential New Zealand app will deliver to its goals – that is to influence the travel decisions of visitors while in New Zealand, encouraging them to do more and see more while here."
“Our long-standing relationship with Whybin\TBWA and DAN’s proven knowledge and expertise ensured that we were in safe hands. The entire development process was seamless.”
CREDITS
Digital Arts Network
Account management – Stephanie Creasy
Project management – Ani Møller
Creative direction – Mark Zeman
User research – Adeline Salkeld-Blears
Interaction design – Jonathan Mead
API development – Dipan Chauhan
Cactuslab
iOS development – Karl von Randow
iOS development – Christian Sheehan
