“Making Athens a must-visit luxury destination”

Reaching towards the end of this beautiful and exciting journey called the ‘’AD&PR LAB’’, as advertisement and public relations students in the Department of Media, Communications and Culture of Panteion University, this semester we participated in the final chapter called "Event Management Lab" moderated by Mrs. Athina Fradelou, Communication and Marketing Consultant and Mrs. Betty Tsakarestou, Associate Professor in the Department of Communication, Media & Culture and Head of Advertising and PR Lab. In this final module we learned about organising and managing online and physical events, how to form the communication strategy concerning a particular event, how to create sponsorships and manage our budget and details on the overall production and promotion of an event. This Lab was very insightful and we received useful feedback when it came to our final project of the Event Management module. In this particular project our task was to create from scratch an event with the goal to promote the city of Athens as a top tourist destination. The event would be organised by the Media, Communications and Culture Department with the collaboration of the Athens Municipality.

This was a very challenging project since we had to combine all the knowledge that we received from the very beginning of the AD&PR LAB sessions starting from our 3rd year of studies. The project had to be completed in a very short period of time so, in a sense, our teams weren’t only challenged on an academic level but also on a soft skills level, because we individually had to manage our stress and work collectively and productively. In the guidelines of this final project we were instructed to organise an e-Conference with the title ‘’ Strategies for developing Athens into a top tourism attraction worldwide’’ ( «Στρατηγικές Ανάπτυξης της Αθήνας για την ανάδειξή της ως κορυφαίος ταξιδιωτικός προορισμός στον κόσμο»). Our team (UpsideDown) had to create the content and the Creative Rationale of the event, come up with the Communication and Marketing Strategy, the target audience and the speakers participating in the event, create the event schedule in detail and create all the media that we would use for the promotion and the communication of this event, such as a Facebook page, an Instagram page, hashtags and advertisements among others.

Our team decided to promote the city of Athens by re-shaping its image from a historical destination to a luxury and high-end destination, focusing on the services it offers and the beauty of the Athenian riviera. While shaping the 5W’s of our event planning, under the category of ‘’Why?’’ we agreed on showing a more modern image of Athens in terms of culture and lifestyle, promote investment and real estate opportunities to international business personas and investors and finally, we took into account the requirement of the task to promote the city of Athens as a year-round tourism destination. Naturally, we had to conduct a SWOT analysis to figure out all the opportunities and strengths, but also the threats and weaknesses that an initiative like this could possibly face, in order to make an error-proof plan, to the extend that this is possible of course.

The strengths that Athens possesses are its multicultural character, the diverse scenery with the ancient monuments, the sea and the Mediterranean climate. Moreover, a strength of the Greek city is the worldwide known Greek cuisine, its vibrant nightlife and hospitality. Some of the weaknesses that our city has concern waste and recycling issues, Athen's lack of greenery, the financial instability of the country as a whole and the unsafe environment in some areas.

The opportunities that Athens holds and that could be beneficial for us to use are the developing urban lifestyle, some economic growth and opportunities, upcoming cultural projects and funding. Something more that Athens lacks and it could promote is its green economy and sustainability.

Lastly, there are quite a few threats that are important for us to keep in mind in order to make the best decision possible and avoid conflicts and mistakes. Those threats are the high competition from the European capitals, rising tensions, the feeling of political instability through the whole country and the fact that it is heavily affected by the Covid-19 crisis.

After the brief we received from the client, in this case Mrs. Fradelou, but also the research we conducted in the beginning, we wrote down the 5 original main pillars or 5W: What, Why, Who, When, Where. The first thing we had to think about before we started organizing the event was what exactly it will be and why this event takes place. After much thought and consideration, we concluded that the event would be an e-conference with some activations on how to make Athens a top tourist place to visit as we aim to re-shape the city image to a modern luxury destination. The dates that have been selected are 10-12 of September 2021 and it will be located in characteristic picturesque places of Athens, such as Vouliagmeni, Zappeion, Sounio and others as we want to highlight the Athenian Riviera.

We wanted to create an event that would highlight the luxury lifestyle of Athens. The main questions we had to answer were what would make Athens a top tourist all year destination and where in Athens this event will be held. We conducted a research to create a unique and exclusive experience for our guests to always remember. First of all, we compared the similar events that happened in Greece as well as abroad the past few years and did some brainstorming on how we can differentiate. We tried to find the little Athenian “diamonds” regarding the beautiful bays, museums and excellent restaurants, that not a lot of people know about, so we can let our guests explore them and live the ultimate 360ο summer life. As we wanted to share with our guests the Greek Mediterranean wealth, we found the most outstanding Greek products to offer them as a gift to taste and learn about them. The purpose behind that was not only to let them know about the high quality of the products that we have, but also give them the chance to bring some of them back home. For example, among those products in our delegates’ bags, were some plant seeds that could be planted in their gardens. Our last but not least preoccupation was to choose our VIP guests very carefully depending on how much influence they have to the audience that we wanted to attract and of course how relevant is their lifestyle is to our event.

The PR Activation was a huge part of our event’s strategy and creation. We have invested in two big categories of media. International coverage and the local one. Both of them reflect the level of professionalism and importance of the event while speaking and addressing a relatable and engaged audience.

International coverage: Travel + Leisure: Article on International edition increasing visibility and credibility of the conference, Bloomberg: Article on International edition focusing on the investment opportunities of Athens as 360 º luxury travel destination

Local coverage: Kathimerini: Detailed article curated by event’s speakers and journalists that will be included in the Sunday paper, To Vima: Daily updates about conference news, talks, and actions, Ta Nea: Ad placement of conference’s brochure in the Sunday paper, Eleftherotypia: Daily updates about conference news, talks, and actions, Vogue Greece: Article placement with carefully curated photos from the conference's events and activities, Forbes (Greek edition): Detailed article after the conference ends including business insights and exclusive content.

Additionally, we have proposed a brochure creation for the event. Brochure’s conference will include all of the event’s actions and programs. It will be a 4-page brochure with a minimal look & feel. The brochure will be distributed both in digital and in eco-friendly paper form.

Sponsorships

Huge collaborations will be in line with our sponsors from digital personas: Thaleia Karafyllidou, Stelios Parliaros, DiscoverGreece.com, Andreas Anagnostopoulos (@isvoss), established brands that are beneficial and in character with our event: Coco-Mat, a Luxury Collection Hotel, STEFANIA VAIDANI, Taxi BEAT, Airbnb Greece, Blueground Greece, Aegean Airlines, Lampsa Hellenic Hotels S.A., COSMOTE, Rolex, and in general multiple public & private held organizations: Municipality of Athens, Ministry of Tourism-Greek National Tourism Organization, Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center, Onassis Stegi, John S. Latsis - Public Benefit Foundation, Athens International Airport, The Hellenic Initiative, Piraeus Bank

Communication Plan, Digital & Social Media

We would have a holistic communication plan with an emphasis on social media presence. The main channels to be used will be Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, Website, and YouTube. Specifically, we will use Facebook: event page -> posts and stories, Instagram: stories, posts, IGTV, highlights, GIF and branded filters, LinkedIn: posts and stories, Twitter: posts, Website: articles and gallery, YouTube: trailer, videos from the conference and special material. All media content will be sponsored accordingly and influencer marketing will also be implemented.

#AD&PRLAB

Panteion University, Event Management Lab

Professor: Betty Tsakarestou

Team: Upside-Down
Members: Marialenadr, Demetria Kara, Merope Kolokassidou, Manolis Kritikos, Anastasia Liakou, Renata Stavrianou