When in Athens: A Plot Twist initiative — Event Management
The last part of our ADandPRLab curriculum and our experience in Advertising and Public Relations consisted of four sessions with the help of Communication and Marketing Expert, Athena Fradelou. The module was called Event Management.
During the sessions, we figured what lies behind organizing an event, the difficulties that may appear, and the specific research that everyone needs to accomplish in order to create an innovative and highly influential event with great results.
Before revealing the case of our final task, we were given some results of a research which was conducted by Euromonitor International in 2019: Athens ranked 43rd amongst other universal traveling destinations with the length of stay being 0.8 nights per person — not exactly representative of a city that has so many interesting hidden- and non- treasures.
Thus, we were asked to create an e-conference or a live one in which the main idea was to elevate Athens as a traveling destination focusing on modern civilization, history-tradition, food, drinks, and Athenian rich natural habitat.
In order to decide what actions would be followed, firstly we needed to conduct our own research. We wanted to figure out what Athens is really like. It was highly important to understand Athens’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. A SWOT analysis really came in handy.
Athens, also, has many competitors. Big established European capital cities, at this point, have a greater audience and possibly a more appealing traveling package, something that we wanted to change for good. On the other hand, Athens has a competitor inside its countries borders: the Greek islands. Many travelers tend to overlook the city of Athens because Greece offers a variety of beautiful islands and Athens, to many visitors, is only a means to visit the islands. We wanted to change that.
The final part of our research was based on figuring out what our target group was and on which people our communication and ideas will be focused. This is what we came up with :
After completing our research, we were in need of discussion to form our big idea and to plan on how to make Athens a great traveling destination. After some discussion within our group, everyone started to suggest different ideas. We noticed that every idea had the same creative rationale behind it and that was really positive because every member was on the same mindset:
Athens is often overlooked among other Greek destinations. We want to bring the attention back to the capital by displaying things that no one can resist: art, food, and drinks! It is important for everyone to be involved.
Our goal was to show the Athenian culture through different interactive events. These events would be a combination of food- art- drinks that are loved in Greece, emphasizing all the reasons why people should visit Athens. This logic was also what led to the creation of our name: When In Athens
About our events: They will be hosted on rooftop gardens with a great view of the center of Athens, on art galleries, and on some of the most graphic Athenian spots.
Our main four events will take place in September. More specifically, they are set for each week of September: The first event, Meet Photography When In Athens, will happen on September 4rth, the second, Paint Your Way When In Athens, will take place on September 11th, the third is a Wine Experience and is set on September 18th and lastly, the final event is on September 25th and it’s called Escape Riviera.
Every event would have some guests that are related to the aspects that we wanted to show such as painters, photographers, wine experts, musicians, and chefs. In every event, they would be 3 foreign travel bloggers documenting their experience to promote the when in Athens project.
Moving on with the first creative idea/event: Meet Photography When In Athens. A challenge to all photographers around the world. The theme of this event was: Your Athens’ point of view. People that have already visited Athens, or are planning to do so in the future will have the opportunity to submit on our website their photos, and through a public vote, the best 10 creations are to be displayed on the day of the event along with their creators-guests. It will take place in a spacious roof garden called Saint George in Lycabettus. Our guests will have the opportunity to enjoy traditional Athenian food and wine and a singing performance by the up-and-coming artist Good Job Nicky. A speech by the American ambassador in Athens Geoffry Pyatt. An important thing that we wanted to emphasize on, besides the influencers, was inviting influential people from the political and marketing field. Finally, Katerina Tsakiri, an inspiring photographer will showcase her own Athens-related gallery. Our three travel bloggers will be Hey Nadine, Budget traveller, and Dan flying solo.
Our second event will be: Paint Your Way When In Athens, with a similar pattern to the previous one. We will challenge every painter globally that wants to draw a painting of the city from their point of view. A public vote will take place on our website with the top 10 paintings featured in our gallery. Our location: The Project Gallery at Thission. The event will contain A live exhibition, painting lesson/seminar for the crowd, a speech by the great brand strategist Peter Economides and lots of wine. Additional guests will be a greek up-and-coming painter Kostas Protopapas and an arguably established painter Stefanos Daskalakis. Our three travel bloggers will be Globetrotter girls, young adventuress, and drive on the left.
Our third event, a Wine Experience When In Athens, is dedicated to wine lovers. It includes a visit to Papagiannakou’s Estate, Markopoulo, where our guests will have the opportunity to get in touch with wine tourism and meet the production process. The event will be even better as it will be followed by a wine tasting competition. The winners will be the ones who will find the most wine ingredients and as a result, they will receive relevant prizes. We will have speeches from honored guests, as in any other event, such as wine experts and specialists, and travel bloggers. At the end of the day, Monica, the famous Greek singer, will sing some of her songs.
Our last event is the definition of the grand final. Escape In Riviera When In Athens, an all-day cruise that will start from Sounio and will finish at Vouliagmeni for a festive beach party. During the day, the cruise ship will make stops and the people will have the opportunity to enjoy a quick dive in the enchanting bays of the Athenian Riviera.
Inside the boat, people will find food stands that will prepare fusion dishes with an Athenian twist and stands with souvenirs from local Athenian shops, in order to strengthen the local market as well. During the cruise, a three-stop dance party will be held. For every floor of the cruise ship, guests will be able to experience different dancing parties-lessons.
Our guests will be Charles Michel, the Belgian Prime Minister-President of the European Council, Sotiris Kontizas, and James Oliver, two really distinguished chefs. Of course, travel bloggers will not be absent from the event.
But this is not the end. After the ending of our events, it’s QUIZ TIME.
An online quiz will be on our website and travelers from all over the world will have the chance to win a trip to Athens during the winter (January-March). Specifically, the questions will be related to Athens’ history and culture. If the participants score 100%, they are true Athenians and have the opportunity to take part in our contest for the trip. Our goal is to make Athens a four-season destination and point out its beauties during winter.
Before all the four events we will publish a press release, the purpose of it is to get attention, create awareness, make news, and generate publicity.
Then, we will also send a newsletter as a tool to share valuable information about the WhenInAthens events, allowing the audience to share engaging content and drive traffic to our website.
What about our social
media platforms?
The WhenInAthens team has already created social media accounts, namely Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. Through these platforms, the events will be promoted with posts and stories both before they are held in order to inform users and during them. As far as “Athenian Quiz” is concerned, it will be distributed, except on the website, on all platforms. Of course, Greek and foreign influencers could not be absent, since depending on the subject they are engaged in, they will promote the appropriate event, in order to attract even more people from both Greece and abroad. Some of the Greek influencers we have chosen are for example Andonis Hambas, who is a visual artist and will promote the event with the art of painting, or Wine Gini, who is a wine expert and will obviously upload to her social media profiles the event that has to do with wine day. We also targeted foreign influencers, some of whom are Mark Wiens (food and traveling blogger), Drew Binsky (American Youtuber), Ferragni Sisters (Italian Influencers), Aida Domenech (Spanish influencer), etc.
Regarding the website, WhenInAthens team created the website www.wheninathens.gr, in which there will be live streams from the events for everyone to see, the contests from each event available for participation along with the results, and the quiz that will determine how Athenian someone is.
Apart from these, articles and information about the events and in general about Athens and the “when in Athens” movement will also be available for reading. Last but not least, the website will be constantly updated with Covid-19 information and news in the city.
Finally, we had to set a communication strategy so as to bring in life our event effectively and hit our target: awareness.
Firstly we had to define our audience and our key messages. Our audience would be our influencer’s audience, people who love travelling and having new experiences and combine their travels with museum visits, good food, and drinks. Secondly, our key messages would be simple and bold: Athens is a great destination for all year: it combines culture, food, drinks, tradition, and entertainment. We would share our content through our social media, outdoor advertising, radio, TV, and digital ads.
Our communication plan would last from 3 August until 3 October. From 3 August until 3 September influencers from abroad will make “stay tuned’’ stories and posts. Also, radio advertising will begin for our event announcement and CTA messages for people to join. Later, from 25 August until 4 September, greek Influencers will start to count the days before our first event. We will also post teasers in the media so as more and more people are aware of our event. Then, each of our events will be promoted separately. 1st event promo will take place 30 August — 4 September, 2nd event promo 6 September — 12 September, 3rd event promo 13 September until 19 September, and 4rth event promo 20 September- 25 September. Last but not least from 26 September until 3 October we will have the winners’ announcements, owned and influencers’ posts and videos on how they had fun during the event, and finally a result vlog video on Youtube with the whole experience and event moments.
OUR TEACHER : Betty Tsakarestou , Athena Fradelou
OUR TEAM MEMBERS :
@aristi papadimitrioy
