The Carnival Corporation-owned brand unveiled the new advertising push, using the trademarked tagline, at the ILTM luxury trade show in Cannes last month.
Seabourn president Josh Leibowitz explained: “Campaigns have tended to be all about the ship. We’re making a big change by making the campaign about the decision-maker. We’re bringing in more of a new feel to our campaign – it’s less about what we do and more about how you feel.
“Seabourn is known for active luxury. People want to get closer and have richer and deeper experiences. Travel – particularly luxury travel – is moving into an era where it’s about what gets you closer. The overarching idea is that people make decisions on how they feel and how they want to feel.”
Leibowitz also stressed the importance of the UK market in 2022, with new expedition ship Seabourn Venture’s inaugural voyage set to depart from Greenwich in London on 10 April 2022.
“The UK is the highest growth opportunity market,” Leibowitz told TTG. “We have quite a bit of capacity in the Med and we’re launching our newest ship from Greenwich in April. People [from the UK] can hop on a Seabourn ship for eight months of the year by driving or by taking a flight of less than three hours.”
Karen Thomas, Seabourn’s senior director of marketing and demand generation, added the UK was the line’s second largest source market and they were looking at holding special events in the UK to showcase the new marketing campaign. “We are leaning into the UK market and it’s going to be really important for us,” she said.
Seabourn’s new marketing campaign will particularly target “affluent, engaged” women who make around 87% of travel decisions. Women also make up around 80% of travel agents or advisors.
“While we were on pause, we took time to reflect and listen to our guests and advisors,” explained Thomas. “With our This is Your Moment campaign, we’re really talking to that decision-maker. It really speaks to everybody but is leaning into those engaged women.
“Announcing it at ILTM is a great opportunity to get in front of the trade and the pinnacle of advisors. They get a sneak peek before going out to the customer base. It’s the most widespread campaign we’ve ever produced.”
’Absolute upgrade’
Leibowitz added that Seabourn had attracted more newcomers to the brand this year after putting its ships back into service during the summer.
“We had 40% of our capacity open in July and have had a much larger percentage of new-to-Seabourn [clients] coming from other luxury cruise lines,” he said. “They’ve said Seabourn was an absolute upgrade with more engaged team members, more fun and more active.”
Leibowitz also urged luxury specialist agents who have yet to experience Seabourn’s ships to contact the company to arrange a visit.
