Celebrating AlUla’s timeless landscapes, deep heritage, and flourishing creative scene, the calendar offers a thoughtfully curated blend of heritage, music, art, wellness, sport, gastronomy, and community experiences, reinforcing AlUla’s emergence as one of the region’s most inspiring year-round destinations.

The AlUla Moments 2025-2026 launches in September with the return of AZIMUTH the annual music  event to mark the Saudi National Day weekend, uniting global and regional music talent with immersive performances, and cutting-edge visuals in a celebration of culture and creativity beneath AlUla’s vast open skies.

October brings a renewed focus on wellness, movement, and heritage with the return of AlUla Wellness Festival, a week-long celebration of balance and transformation. Alongside daily yoga sessions, guided meditations, and live performances, the programme introduces for the first time high-energy challenges including the AlUla Half Marathon Road Race, AlUla 24-Hour Endurance Race, AlUla Duathlon, and Ashar Valley Triathlon, alongside iconic fitness sessions with Les Mills, all inviting participants to push their limits amid breathtaking desert landscapes.

Launching in November, The Ancient Kingdoms Festival invites visitors to ‘journey through time’ and experience AlUla’s spectacular ancient sites and stories, brought to life in exciting new ways. From day-time discoveries to after-dark encounters, visitors can step into the world’s largest living museum to explore the extraordinary landscapes shaped by nature, history, and human legacy at the heart of the Incense Road. Highlights include Hegra After Dark , The Incense Road Experience, the epic Hegra Drone Show ‘Stories from the Sky’, Ikmah After Dark and Hegra Candlelit Classics concerts, featuring world-renowned international artists. An unmissable opportunity for visitors to enjoy close encounters on the sites where history was made, celebrating AlUla’s cultural legacy.

In December, Winter at Tantora returns with its beloved blend of music, gastronomy, and heritage celebration. Opening with a tribute to the Saudi Year of Handicrafts and a performance by acclaimed artist Ahlam, this year’s edition features highlights including Shorofat Tantora, Old Town Culinary Voyage, Tantora Old Town Nights, and exclusive fine dining restaurants with the return of Ducasse and Annabel’s, all set against the enchanting backdrop of AlUla’s historic oasis.

The start of 2026 is marked by world-class sporting events that spotlight equestrian excellence and endurance racing. In January, AlUla Desert Polo returns to the purpose-built sand track near AlUla’s sandstone cliffs, drawing elite players and international attention. Later that month, the AlUla Tour brings top international cyclists to the region for a multi-stage UCI Asia Tour race, showcasing AlUla’s dramatic landscapes and rising status in global sport. In February, AlFursan Endurance AlUla challenges the world’s top riders in one of the sport’s most prestigious competitions, while the AlUla Trail Race welcomes athletes from around the globe to tackle one of the region’s most scenic—and demanding—trail courses.

Returning for its fifth edition in January, AlUla Arts Festival celebrates creative expression across disciplines, transforming the landscape into a living gallery. The festival features the fourth edition of Desert X AlUla, a landmark open-air exhibition placing visionary contemporary artworks by Saudi and international artists in the dramatic desert landscape, and a major new exhibition curated by AlUla’s contemporary art museum in collaboration with the renowned Pompidou Centre, Paris. AlJadidah Arts District will again be animated by performances and programming and will feature an exhibition of contemporary AlUla-inspired design. 

The AlUla Moments 2025-2026 calendar reflects the destination’s evolution into a global stage for creative expression, human connection, and extraordinary experiences. It celebrates what makes AlUla truly unique – its culture, nature, and community – and extends a bold invitation for the world to be part of its revitalizing story.

The videos depict some of Jordan’s landmarks, including the Dead Sea, Petra, and Wadi Rum, all imagined through the lens of AI but turning out to be real places. They are part of the Jordan Tourism Board's strategy to reposition this destination in the region. Adpro Communications stepped in to find the sweet spot where people, culture, and brand intersected to be appealing to the digitally fluent, intuitively curious, and future-focused travelers.

In 2021, the Jordan Tourism Board ran an extensive brand revitalization exercise aimed at shaking off the Kingdom's 'history lesson' status. With the 'Kingdom of Time' brand, the country reintroduced itself through a new lens, where past, present, and future meet. Following an integrated launch, the Jordan Tourism Board was looking for a disruptive and relevant way to maintain momentum, especially amongst independent, digitally empowered explorers seeking meaning and human connections, as well as covering the need to reposition the brand amongst heavy competition in the region.

The team at Adpro Communications decided to speak a language this type of audience is fluent in, one only they would understand to build the needed affinity. They jumped on the AI's craze of converting text to image based on descriptive prompts people were entering to describe surreal places out of a fiction movie. On the search window of the interface, an 'imagine' invitation describes a dream destination that soon evolves into an invitation to 'experience' this place, as AI brings to life locations from Jordan without mentioning the country, city, place, monument, or site, under the campaign #ExperienceJordAIn.

Most of the images for Google Street View are collected via cars, but in 2014 in Abu Dhabi, the task was given to an animal — a 10-year-old camel named Raffia who walked through the desert around Liwa Oasis with a Street View camera on her back.

The ten most popular places on Street View in MENA over the past year were:

Globally, over the last 15 years, Street View cars have traveled over 10 million miles – a distance that circles the entire globe more than 400 times – and collected more than 220 billion images. On Google Maps Street View, viewers can also look into historical images for some of these locations to see how they’ve changed over time.

The tourism sector has always proven to be resilient and while demand for international travel currently remains low, domestic tourism is strengthening significantly. Countries are looking for ways to re-boot, restore visitor confidence, and reshape tourism in the post-Covid-19 future. Now is the time for the travel industry and governments to reinforce coordination efforts that will restore the sector and create the structural transformation needed to build a stronger, sustainable, and resilient tourism economy.

Effective PR and communications will be essential in ensuring continued reassurance and confidence to secure the trust of stakeholders. Both industry and consumer media outlets are craving reliable information and advice on how to navigate the path forward in uncertain times. The brands that are active now with thought-leadership and creative content will secure the best position when it is time to rebound. 

“With public opinion on travel still volatile, businesses must redefine their communications using strategies and tactics that promote safety and responsible travel. Destination marketing will need to shift from promoting travel to promoting safety and supporting local communities,” advises Abdulrahman Inayat, Director and Co-Founder of W7Worldwide. “During Covid-19, you need to react in real time, constantly pivoting messaging and content to address what customers and journalists want to know right now.”

Attitudes, motivations, and preferences of tourists and business travellers will have changed – perhaps forever. The interim plan is straightforward in capturing as much domestic business as possible and in beginning to encourage audiences to plan for the future by tapping into what they are most excited about after lockdown, such as the resumption of freedom, nature, a much deserved holiday after stressful times, reuniting with relatives and loved ones abroad.

W7Worldwide developed a 7-Step Guide for Hospitality and Tourism operators to formulate the right communications strategies that will help rebuild towards recovery. This includes stakeholder mapping in a changed business environment, adapting messaging, maximizing the use of digital channels to take advantage of higher on-line consumption, engaging in sector cooperation and public affairs efforts, proactive media relations tailored to local market needs, direct marketing and planning for the future.  

The industry was healthy before the pandemic hit and, while we do not know exactly when, we can be certain that travellers will be back.  Recovery will not be identical in different parts of the world and will run on different timelines. This means brands have to continually reevaluate what the competitive landscape might look like post-recovery and take steps now to be ready to gain market share, enter new markets, and offer new products. W7Worldwide’s Communications Strategy and Planning Guide will help travel and tourism brands make that recovery period healthier. 

Click here to read the full report.

The ongoing impact of digital on the tourism industry in the Middle East, Africa and South Asia emerged as a popular topic of discussion at the annual MEASA Aviation Show in Dubai on October 14.

The event, which has been organized for several years by Terrapinn Middle East, featured tracks such as a Travel Tech Show that shed light on possibilities for digital engagement within the travel agency, tourism and hospitality sectors.

The new journey

The travel experience has reached unchartered territory in terms of technology’s impact on journeys – both in regards to customers and the actual voyage. From websites that help cost-conscious travelers find affordable deals and organize personalized itineraries, to mobile apps like Google Maps’s Live View AR feature, that guides lost tourists with augmented reality-enhanced walking directions, travel will never be the same.

This theme was examined closely during a MEASA Aviation Show keynote speech by Norberto Cibien, Accenture’s managing director – products lead Middle East & Turkey, revolving around “post-digital” travel.

“Travel companies have embarked on a bold and somewhat mystifying trip to a new world. It’s a world where passengers and guests communicate their demands instantly and expect gratification in real-time [… a world where] travel experiences are not isolated events, but part of a connected journey,” said Cibien.

“Digital technologies have taken travel companies halfway there. Now, to meet people where they are, at moments they choose, travel companies need to embrace ‘post-digital’ technologies: distributed ledgers, AI, extended reality and even quantum computing (DARQ),” he added.

Digital deals

As exciting as travel itself is, it’s hard to overlook the excitement and anticipation that build from the moment when itineraries are planned and airplane tickets are bought, preferably at affordable prices. Whether through desktop, mobile or apps, the search and booking experiences offered by travel aggregators have played a key role in travel planning.

Travel search engine Wego has kept its fingers on the pulse of millennial travelers within and outside of MENA, thanks to initiatives like its mobile-first approach 2019 report on the world’s most Instagrammable cities; and its MENA Traveller Destination Leaderboard revealed at Arabian Travel Market in Dubai.

According to Mamoun Hmedan, Wego managing director of MENA and India, the early adopter approach by the Singapore-headquartered aggregator has played a major role part in its success.

“When the e-commerce world was shifting into mobile a few years back, we adopted a mobile-first strategy and launched our localized app which positioned us in front of the youth audience. […] We have split our social media strategy into informative social media pages and space for users to interact with us as a brand, and provided them with 24/7 customer service support,” said Hmedan.

He added that usage of newer digital tools has not come at the expense of tried-and-true channels such as email marketing.

“At Wego, we understand the significance of data and have designed our CRM strategy around those data touchpoints, which allows us to communicate with our users based on their behavior, sending targeted and relevant messages for our users via push notifications and emails.”

The importance of mobile platforms is particularly noteworthy among young people in the GCC, even in regard to “staycations” and internal tourism.

Cleartrip director of marketing Matthew Sliedrecht followed up his company’s fifth Travel Insights Report published with flyin.com in September with analysis of the rise of mobile amongst Saudi Arabia’s young travelers.

“Millennials and the up-and-coming Gen Z in Saudi Arabia are mobile-first bookers. In the first half of 2019, we’ve seen a 145% increase in mobile bookings and this is being driven by millennials and Gen Z customers. We have seen a significant increase in domestic tourism in Saudi Arabia […] In the last two years, we have seen a 42% increase in domestic travel as airlines expand their routes and invest in new aircrafts,” said Sliedrecht.

“With the focus on tourism as part of Saudi’s Vision 2030, and the launch of Saudi Seasons (by the Saudi Commission for Tourism and National Heritage), starting in Riyadh, we are very excited to help support domestic tourism within Saudi and bring in more international travelers to the Kingdom,” he added.

Low-cost leaders

Given that the young population in the GCC often wants to simply get from point A to point B without a luxury flight experience, there are opportunities for low-cost carriers (LCCs) to find a niche.

That’s certainly the case for two of the recently-launched LCCs from GCC countries that were at the MEASA Aviation Show.

Con Korfiatis, CEO of flyadeal (a LCC owned by Saudia), explained that mobile has proved to be a strong factor for the airline’s growing popularity among Saudi tourists; a trend that could be repeated by global tourists looking to explore the kingdom thanks to the new tourist visas.

“Two years on from our launch in September 2017, we have 11 aircraft and have flown five million passengers. Over 90% of our sales are online and over 60% of all sales are via mobile devices. The kingdom of Saudi Arabia is an e-commerce market: the perfect test bed for technological innovation. Our target customers are therefore Generation Y and Z,” said Korfiatis.

“We have an incredibly young demographic with 80% of the population being less than 40 years of age […] The country has just extended visa on arrival to 51 countries, with over 20,000 visas being issued within ten days. This is a country moving at breakneck speed,” he added.

The airline previously made waves using social media to promote a prank “Cargo Passenger Class” flight option that went viral and increased its popularity on search engines, leading to more bookings.

ما يحتاج درجة خزانة الأمتعة! مع #طيران_أديل #سافر_بأقل_الأسعار في كل الأوقات! ? ✈️#درجة_خزانة_الأمتعة

We don’t need Cargo Passenger Class! With #flyadeal you can #FlyforLess
anytime ? ✈️#cargo_passenger_class pic.twitter.com/pVDJPFyG8P

— طيران أديل (@flyadeal) December 16, 2018

Meanwhile, in neighboring Oman, SalamAir has started its own journey of making destinations like Salalah more accessible to tourists hoping to enjoy a pleasant getaway in the Sultanate.

The airline utilizes platforms like Instagram to raise awareness about promotions that target foreign tourists while highlighting its outbound flights to nearby countries. While Salalah is known by GCC-based tourists as a place to escape during the heat of the Gulf’s summer, it could soon be discovered by Europe-based travelers thanks to SalamAir’s online marketing campaigns, according to SalamAir CEO Mohamed Ahmed.

Dynamic destinations

In an era when millennials favor companies with purposes that align with their own, a new style of travel for young people is on the rise, accompanied by the relevant marketing approaches.

VisitBritain launched in 2018 a campaign that focused on domestic tourism over short periods of time, such as weekend getaways. The #MyMicroGap campaign presented a variety of ideas, including encouraging young Brits to give back to the environment through sustainability-centric initiatives such as cleaning up plastic and fighting climate change.

Leveraging the popularity of Instagram, VisitBritain also partnered with The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) to launch a crowdsourced photography campaign capturing images of a rare species of puffins and sharing them through the #Puffarazzi hashtag.

View this post on Instagram

We want your hungry puffin pictures! Join the puffin party and submit them to our #ProjectPuffinUK #Puffarazzi (Link in bio) http://bit.ly/2Q5VDDc #Birds #RSPB #August #CitizenScience

A post shared by RSPB Love Nature (@rspb_love_nature) on Aug 5, 2019 at 11:00am PDT

 VisitBritain Director of APMEA Tricia Warwick explained that #MyMicroGap is part of a plan to instill a love of travel in young people that will inspire future trips.

“By working with destinations and tourism businesses, our Microgap campaign is igniting the passion for travel in young people and building a habit that will last a lifetime, boosting growth from tourism and spreading its economic benefits across most of the year,” said Warwick.

In the MENA region, young people are also seeking personalized travel experiences and curated trips in small groups. Instagram Stories have helped document the Tamashee Experience – short guided trips of historic regions in the UAE and Saudi Arabia led by Tamashee co-founders Mohammed Kazim and Muneera Al Tamimi.

View this post on Instagram

#AlQattbyTamashee #TamasheexLevelShoes

A post shared by تماشي (@tamashee) on May 18, 2018 at 7:41am PDT

Additionally, Egypt-based Visit & Go is an Arabic-language marketplace for booking tours and activities, offering tourists from MENA countries access to tours led in Arabic in destinations around the world.

Nabil El-Shafeay, Visit & Go founder and CEO, said mobile traffic has stood out as a significant portion of the visitors to the portal: “Thanks to high (levels of) tech adoption in the Middle East, mobile penetration is quite high – more than 80%. This is making a significant impact on the travel experience overall.”

Elías Jabbe (Elias213.com) is a communications consultant, writer and traveler based in Dubai, UAE. 

According to a press statement, Isobar will be driving digital strength and brand loyalty through a  digital media strategy across seventeen key markets including the GCC, China, Japan, Germany, Italy, France, Spain, Sweden, Czech Republic, Poland, Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, India, USA, and the UK.

“To increase engagement with ETPB’s target audience, Isobar will leverage the power of data to deliver actionable insights across all relevant digital channels and touch points,” said a press statement.

Marize Sami, General Manager Isobar Egypt, responds to our questions on why this partnership is vital for Egypt’s tourism project.

Egypt has been trying to promote itself online over the years, how is this time different? 

In the past there has always been a focus on traditional communication channels. Even when using social media, there was a lack of targeting and creation of tailored messages to the different needs and lifestyles of tourists from vastly different markets.

Isobar will leverage the power of data to deliver actionable insights across relevant digital channels and touch points which will give us much deeper understanding of customer behaviour and enable us to develop contextually relevant content and digital experiences throughout the entire travel journey.

What is the message you would focus on to promote tourism in Egypt?

We will treat every market separately according to the market needs by showcasing the beauty Egypt and highlighting the diversity of destinations available and the authenticity of Egyptian traditions. There are 3 main components following the reform of the ministry which will be reflect in our communications:

• Gem2020; promoting the opening of the grand Egyptian museum, the largest museum in the world.
• People to people: aiming at portraying Egypt not only as a contemporary and prime touristic destination but also shedding the light on the diversity and authenticity of the Egyptian people.
• Branding by destination: creating an identity for each of Egypt’s unique destinations.

Why are the old ways not working anymore to attract tourists to Egypt?

“One size fits all” doesn’t work anymore and we are now in a position for content to be tailored to meet very specific needs. Every tourist is different; some people visit Egypt to enjoy sun and sea, others come for cultural trips, other for medical and last but not least those who come for visiting the authentic religious sites. By having a deep understanding all of the different travelers who might consider Egypt as a destination, we are in a prime position to market Egypt in the way it should be.

What do you mean by using data driven approaches? 

This means that we will be collecting data that gives us perspective on what every market is looking for, what the seasonality is and what attracts tourists from each country. The data will also be able to give us a detailed perspective on demographics, their lifestyles, their events, their vacations etc. which will help us deliver personalized, seamless and memorable experiences that drive engagement, transaction and loyalty for every market.

Do you think your new approaches will be effective in changing the ongoing reputation of Egypt?

Visitors are starting to come back to Egypt in larger and larger numbers each year. Our approach will be a big help in communicating both the new attractions in Egypt and celebrating their heritage. A lot of people don’t know what the country has to offer. With such a targeted approach we can reach tourists in a unique way that resonates with them, increasing the chances that they will consider visiting Egypt.

The incident comes within a long line of different incidents that are often attributed to influencers. The influencer marketing is believed to be running the tourism scene. Most companies and brands rely essentially on influencers to market their products and services, which could be successful if the right influencer has been chosen. There are around one billion monthly active Instagram users. Today, influencers or not, the platform is considered as a go to destination to search for vacation destinations.

But are countries ready for Instagram’s help?

Santorini in Greece, is an example of a landscape that has influencers scrambling to the country for that perfect, insta-worthy vacation  photo. In an interview with The Economist’s 1843, Loukas Bellonias, deputy mayor of the islands, acknowledged the uniqueness of Santorini’s picturesque landscape. However also discussed how social media has transformed Santorini so quickly into the most popular travel destination in the world that even the Greek telecom providers are struggling to provide coverage due to the influx of people using their services. 

Dave, from the famous travel and hotel blog, SantoriniDave, told Communicate that people should have more positive outlook regarding the topic. “Overall, tourism is great for Greece and its economy. The growth in visitors over the past few years has been key to the country crawling out of its financial predicament,” he said. 

But despite Dave’s positive outlook, it is impossible to ignore the local residents when they express their dismay regarding the topic. Not only Greece and Indonesia voiced their concerns, but there has been various other complaints from local citizens of popular tourist destinations who often feel that tourists tend to disrespect their homeland and take personal offense to it.

Logan Paul, a YouTuber, who also had a show last year in the Dubai Mall was caught up in a scandal wherein he filmed a deceased person’s body while on a visit to Japan’s infamous ‘Suicide Forest’. He then shared it in a light-hearted Japan-vlog on his main channel. 

The incident caused an uproar not only in Japan, but elsewhere,  especially amongst the YouTuber community. Travel.com, an online travel and tourism related website listed Japan, amongst 24 others, on a list indicating countries that are not too fond of tourists. 

Tourists only attract more tourists, and influencers can turn any city into a seasonal hotspot with a simple Instagram post.Creation of waste and ecological is one of the top concerns of these tourist destinations. In some places such as East Java, local communities compete with each other to go viral. In some occasions, to get a “worthy selfie”, influencers might ask for certain changes that does not necessarily show mindfulness for the environment. 

“Tourists come to take photos without interacting with the villagers; it’s like the people are just objects. These selfie spots neglect the village’s unique potential, and in many cases change its authenticity. This is happening in many areas in Indonesia,” said Bachtiar Djanan, a hostel owner, to kr-asia.com.

In some cases such as in Venice and Barcelona, tourism has raised the living expenses that people took to the streets to protest. Another drawback to influx of insta-tourists is crowding the area. Complaints has been against cruise ships across different parts in Europe. “Cruise ship visitors spend very little money (compared to overnight guests) and yet disproportionately contribute to the crowds and line-ups that can form in the main towns,” added Dave, the travel blogger. Some of these has led countries to take certain precaution measures such as cracking down on unlicensed airbnb rentals or even putting a ban on tourism in certain areas.

In a 2017 study by the University of Georgia, researchers concluded that “Social Return” is an important element in choosing where travelers want to travel. It is the element of appearing cool and wanting to be part of the group that makes people chose where they want to go. Research by Fullscreen & Shareablee, suggests that around half of their respondents experiment with the product/experience that an influencer shares.

A recent example took place in Australia in July, when the West Australia Tourism Minister Paul Papalia joined around 40 digital influencers, spent a five-day trip to the Kimberley. A trip was paid for by GoPro and Australian taxpayers raised questions on its influence on the tourism sector. The influencers were from 11 different countries, all of which were under 30, with massive base of followers on Instagram. 

“But other than that, they are very connected in the online world, and they have incredible reach and that’s a good thing for Western Australia,” said the Australian minister to ABC Australia. He added, “It was a pretty minimal cost. We don’t reveal individual costs of that nature, but I can tell you what we spend on influencers in a year, and that’s less than 1 per cent of our marketing budget which is $45 million.”

Digital advertising represented the largest portion of ad spend for Middle East marketers in 2018 at 52 percent— and that number will only grow, according to the 2019 Middle East Report on Travel Advertising published by SOJERN. Whereas, two in three (61 percent) travel marketers plan to spend more on digital in 2019. 

Each of these internet users has contact with thousands of ads daily. Hence, marketers’ biggest job is to be among those ads that are seen and somehow processed by the user’s mind.  Furthermore, the report states that YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram are the most utilized ad video platforms in the Middle East. Hence, travel marketers plan to use them in 2019 at 70 percent, 68 percent, and 68 percent respectively. 

Marketers are aware that both branding and performance marketing are valuable and bring positive results. However, performance marketing is seen as the one resulting in company’s growth, and brand marketing is more of a long-term position building. Branding, which for so long was the key for marketing, is challenged by the performance tools, because the focus for marketers changed from reach to ROI. As a result, we are observing significant pivot towards measurable, short-term performance.

Differences

What is the difference? In general, we can say that branding stands for all the activities aimed to boost brand visibility, recognition and making customers loyal to the brand. In digital marketing for branding campaigns advertisers usually use static banners, that are designed to target the specific groups, based on social characteristics. Also, the placements are often chosen in advance, to reach the widest group. At the same time, it seems that performance is everything that branding isn’t. When people think about the performance marketing, they consider narrow target groups or even the ability to target the right person at the right place and time. Especially when it comes to achieving significant, measurable goals. Marketers are now able to plan and drive 1:1 marketing because sophisticated technology, data analysis and insights allow to see particular consumers when they are visiting a certain store and shopping for a particular item. 

Retargeting – chance for hybrid approach

In general, retargeting campaigns used to be classified as pure performance marketing. The results are easily measurable and the creatives are full of products instead of branding. But is it impossible for retargeting to include branding visuals? Absolutely not! In fact, we observe that brands now more and more often choose the hybrid model which answers both short- and long-term goals. In our experience as a retargeting provider, we dealt with numerous clients and their various needs. Some were solely focused on the performance, with not a smallest input in terms of creatives look, and some came with branding strategy that is unchangeable and needs to be implemented into retargeting campaigns. This taught us that the balance is the key to reach the best results. 

The effectiveness of the display creative is not only based on technology and advanced algorithms that allow marketers to personalize the advertising message and recommend offer tailored to users need. The consistency in marketing activities – including the advertiser’s brand book and the key visuals of particular campaign are also extremely important. Creatives prepared in such way are able to bring significant sales uplift and at the same time positively influence the brand’s perception.

To conclude, the one question advertisers are trying to find an answer to is: how to make marketing the most efficient? One possible answer could be – reconcile performance and branding. Nowadays, when media mix is becoming more and more driven by data, both performance and brand marketers should learn about each other’s goals and together work to deliver the right message to the right person at the right time. It is crucial to plan the strategy and tools in the joint way. Breaking down the silos structure is the first and often most difficult step for brands. However, having your entire marketing team present when making planning decisions is critical to aligning behind common KPIs and ensuring there is an integrated strategy in place for success. Open-minded approach will enable teams to make a good use of each tools’ advantages in mixed-way. Either using branding elements in ‘performance retargeting campaign’ or using personalized approach and performance metrics in ‘branding campaigns’. Mixed tactics will drive better results for both sales and brand recognition.

Tomasz Wnuk is the General Manager Middle East and Africa at RTB House

At the launch event of this digital tool, Mohamad Mourad, managing director of Google MENA, said, “It’s important to put things into perspective when we do things like this, because sometimes it can be seen as a digital asset or a digital website.” He explained that this is a milestone in Jumeirah’s brand journey where they will set a precedent for the travel and tourism industry.

He continued, “It’s not only an immersive user experience but also a new venture in starting to explore the power of digital and the power of technology. Our mission at Google is to organize the world of information and to make it universally accessible and useful. This is really usually done at Google through technology-led innovation.”

Gerald Lawless, president and group CEO of Jumeirah Group, said, “What we’re talking about today is the imagination and the anticipation of travel. Many people say if you know too much about your destination of travel, if you’ve almost experienced it in virtual reality, you won’t want to travel. But I think it’s quite the opposite, the experience in advance wets the appetite to actually experience it in reality.”

“This is something that I believe will help travel, tourism and hospitality to grow,” he added.

OMD was responsible for the media strategy behind the launch. Speaking of this interaction in a press statement, Nadim Samara, managing director of OMD UAE and Lower Gulf, said, “It has been a truly incredible experience for the team to make it happen with Jumeirah, Google and Media Monks. Enriching guests’ experiences with innovative formats like 360-degree video, which span across markets as well as devices. OMD has leveraged its insights on consumer behaviors and deployed fully integrated media strategies to ensure [Jumeirah Inside’s] successful launch.”

Click here to visit Jumeirah Inside.

Abdallah Saab, General Manager Posterscope MENA, says in a statement to the press, “We are very excited to add this new data tool to our product portfolio. As the region’s first and only airport specialist, we will now have access to a huge wealth of data that will help us to continue delivering intelligent communications solutions to advertisers wishing to use Out-of-Home media in airports. Our analysis of this data will enable better planning of airport campaigns as well as live, accurate reporting.”

This big data provides excellent understanding of passenger trends and will allow for actionable insight and planning across three key data sets: Origin, Seasonality, Premium Passengers (or a combination of data sets).

The origin data set, for example, will provide better guidance on market selection to effectively reach target passengers by origin and guide advertisers on where to place budgets. By tracking origin and analyzing their Global travel behaviors Posterscope are able to better understand key departing, arriving and transfer hubs for that specific audience. Ultimately this will lead to greater cost efficiency for clients whose marketing dollars will be guided as to where and when to target the maximum amount of passengers.