James Nesbitt is returning as the face of Thomas Cook in new TV adverts focussing on exclusive holiday concepts and online innovations.
The adverts reunite Nesbitt with award winning director Declan Lowney, who he worked on Cold Feet in the 1990s and who most recently directed the Alan Partridge: Alpha Papa film.
The brand-building TV push breaks on Boxing Day, with three humorous scenarios highlighting the group’s value and experience while driving awareness of Cook’s web, mobile and tablet sites to position the business as the leading ‘e-tailer’ in the holiday market.
The TV adverts are part of an integrated marketing campaign that highlights the company’s focus on bringing ‘high tech, high touch’ to life with holidays available to book across a number of channels, with price parity across the board.
Cook’s agency branches are to have a facelift following the on-going replacement of fascias following the ‘sunny heart’ rebrand in October.
Shop windows and interiors will feature the new branding, with window displays showcasing the company’s holiday sale message using red as the main colour.
Retail point of sale will highlight a selection of value holidays, as well as key peaks commercial messaging throughout January and the ‘Let’s Go! to Thomascook.com’ tagline, to further highlight the company’s omni-channel approach.
The Thomascook.com home page and landing pages have been redesigned to feature the new branding.
Features include a new ‘one search’ functionality, which allows customers easier access to a wide variety of varying products and destinations, with enhanced content including 34 additional destination pages and simplified search functions.
Cook says the site has also been optimised to better support the growing audience who use mobile and tablets to search and book.
Personalised emails will be sent to all Cook customers, with communications segmented by audience type to deliver more personalised content for family and non-family bookers.
It will feature additional incentives to drive bookings including promotional codes as well as informing customers of the location of their nearest Thomas Cook/Co-operative travel shop.
Outdoor advertising will appear in key towns and cities in January and February with tactical messaging to complement the TV ads.
This will highlight regional flying and specific destinations in association with key partner tourist boards.
Each will also bear the tagline ‘Let’s Go! to Thomascook.com’ to further reinforce the company’s web capabilities.
Sales, marketing and e-commerce director Mike Hoban said: “We showcased key strands and features of Thomas Cook’s end-to-end holiday offering in our original series of TV ads that debuted in June 2013.
“In light of our re-brand, and the developments within our business since the last ads were conceived, we wanted to develop further to create, sustain and standout by focussing on our distinct, exclusive product segments as well as a call to action to Thomascook.com.”
He added that the aim of the campaign was to bring a “light-hearted look and feel to the brand” while showcasing value-for-money holidays in 2014.
“As well as our sales offers – which we believe are the very best in the market – our turn-of-year initiatives will highlight our online capabilities and further illustrate how our experience and expertise as the pioneers in travel means that our customers can rest assured that we have the perfect holiday that’s right for them,” said Hoban.