Oprah effect could see 140,000 extra American visitors claims research
Some 140,000 Americans may be set to visit Australia after watching Oprah’s Ultimate Australian Adventure, research commissioned by Tourism Australia suggests.
The provisional data from the Repucom survey indicates 61% of respondents who were aware of Oprah’s Australian shows had explored travel options to Australia, whether through looking at flight prices, talking to an Australian travel specialist or visiting Australia.com.
Out of the 1,200 surveyed, three per cent claimed they had booked a trip to Australia following the screenings of the four-part series.
Based on the estimated 4.17 million Americans who watched the shows, Tourism Australia managing director Andrew McEvoy said this equated to nearly 140,000 visitors, spending an average of $4,800 each, or $670 million in expenditure.
The International Visitor Survey, conducted for the Department of Resources Energy and Tourism, shows total expenditure by American visitors in 2010 equated to $1.1 billion.
Online travel agency Orbitz, which partnered with TA in the Great Aussie Sale promotion alongside the shows, reported a 4.6% increase in bookings since the Oprah shows were screened in the US in January. Year-on-year figures for January and February combined saw revenue from flight and hotel bookings rise by 9.65% and 13.65% respectively.
Visits to Tourism Australia’s website www.australia.com during January and February were nearly double the monthly average prior to this period.
An encore broadcast of the series in the US will commence on March 24 with the Great Aussie Sale to be re-launched including airline partnerships with V Australia and Delta.
Out of the 1,200 survey participants, 200 were non-Oprah viewers.
Update March 22nd: Tourism Australia adds – A total of 472,126 Americans visited Australia during 2010 (Source: ABS), spending a total of $2.1 billion, including air fares and pre-paid packages. Tourism Australia believes that the US market has the potential to grow to between 760,000 and 840,000 visitors, contributing between $4.5 billion and $5.5 billion in overnight expenditure by 2020 (Source: 2020 Tourism Industry Potential).
Excellent intelligence that your Cap’n will action immediately – I’m buying a burger franchise on the forecourt of the Opera House.
Many a cheer for the Overweight and Over Here!
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That’s potentially a damn fine Return On Marketing Investment in my book …
$670m estimated tourist spending (mostly incremental?) from what, +/- $50m total TA marketing spend (I think I just made that figure up, but you get the point)
And I like the way campaign success seems to be being judged on actual tourist expenditure here, not just on tourist arrival numbers or worse, publicity value.
Assuming these American visitor were mostly incremental i.e. not planning to travel here regardless of the Oprah Effect, then bravo Tourism Australia.
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A lot more than 4 million Americans watched those Australia shows. Oprah’s been averaging 7 million American viewers this season & those were big shows.
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Is this data wrong? By my count it’s been overstated by about AUD$350 million.
Assuming the indication from the Repucom survey is accurate, then we could expect three per cent of Opera’s US audience to be booking a trip to Australia. That number would be 125,100 additional visitors rather than 140,000 stated above.
According to the International Visitor Survey the typical US visitor spent $2,552 while in Australia (440,000 visitors, AUD$1.21 billion expenditure) – not $4,800 each. Note, the AUD$1.2 billion cited by Tourism Australia in annual US expenditure was for year ending 2009 not 2010 – which was about $100 million less.
This would be a total expenditure of about $319 million not $670 million for 2011.
Or course it could be that the Oprah audience demographic is much more likely to spend twice what the average US visitor would because they’re doing so much more. About 63 per cent of Oprah’s US audience has a household income of less than USD$100,000 per year – but doubling the expenditure would be a stretch.
Even then given that 1-out-of-every-2 US travelers are return visitors (not to mention those already coming for business or study), so wouldn’t need Oprah’s endorsement to return then this number could also be lower again.
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Hi solarpoweredcalculator
Thanks for picking me up on the 2009/2010 figure, I have amended in the piece.
The research suggests that 3.3 per cent of respondents claimed to have booked a trip to Australia. Through my calculations, 3.3 per cent of 4.17 million is 137,610.
According to one of the tables (Table 17 if you’re looking at the research) “Average expenditure for all visitors by country of residence and main purpose of journey by expenditure item” of the International Visitors Survey released in March this year, $4,829 was the average individual expenditure for visitors from the USA however on Table 1 the figure is $1.1 billion for total expenditure which doesn’t equate when you times that figure by total visitor numbers, you are right.
Let me have a look into this with Tourism Australia for you and get back to you.
Cheers,
Alice – Mumbrella
$320m or $670m, my Burger stand is going to be supersizing a obese Texans to the max! Where Gadaffi fails, I will succeed in bringing death to “The Great Satan” via clogged arteries and heart attacks.
Thanks Oprah – I’ll shout you your first “Dr Phil’s Triple Whopper” (with cheese).
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Hi,
I have updated the story with more information from Tourism Australia.
Cheers,
Alice – Mumbrella
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