Hawkins International Public Relations | Agency Profile, Contacts, AOR, Client Relationships

See Winmo sales intelligence in action

Millennial, Gen-Z Parent Opps: Carnival increases media dollars, nearly triples digital display spend (Score 61)

In Wunderman as CRM AOR. Since the formation of this partnership, Carnival increased media investments, which will lead into 2020 to further support brands on a global scale, per its Q4 2019 earnings call. The increased spending began in Q4 2019 (September); Carnival's fiscal year closes in November.

Carnival is focusing on Alaska to drive business specifically in that region, but it is also enhancing its digital marketing capabilities "dramatically" to increase its consumer-acquisition efficiency. We may or may not see increased digital spending as a result, such as through digital display and targeted social ads. Carnival reflected on the impact the elections may have on its numbers in 2020, hence the need to improve digital effectiveness. It claimed that "elections can create uncertainty," so sellers could possibly see increase marketing initiatives to keep people aboard the cruise line this year.

According to its latest SEC filing, reported in September 2019, revenues are still increasing YOY, which is good news for sellers and agencies alike; since Carnival is still increasing profits but also sees opportunities to possibly spend more in digital, the company may be more willing to seek extra help and advertising support. For the three months ended August 31, revenue was reportedly $6.5 billion in 2019 compared to $5.8 billion in 2018. 

Carnival has spent approximately $9.3 million on digital display ads in the past year (January 2019 - 2020), according to Adbeat. About half of these ads have run programmatically through Google ($4.4 million) onto sites such as xfinity.com ($263.6k), vacationidea.com, dictionary.com, timeout.com and wikihow.com. Other ads were either videos through YouTube ($3.7 million) or placed site direct ($3.2 million). Carnival, therefore, aggressively increased its digital display spend in the past year because from January 2018 - 2019, it spent an estimated $3.6 million on this channel. 

Carnival invest approximately $872.7k in national TV to promote its business from January 2019 to December 2019. It spent evenly throughout the year with the highest single spend in mid-January, so sellers may want to contact them soon to get the most TV opportunities. 

Sellers -- Kantar claims Carnival increased print ad spend immensely in H1 2019, particularly in Q2 for magazines; get this company's attention soon for print ad space, given it follows this trend in Q2 2020. It targets millennial couples and families, typically. Offer digital display space getting the attention of parents and possibly HENRY Gen Z & millennials (high earning--not rich yet). 

Agency readers -- To the best of our knowledge, Carnival works with creative AOR FIG. It could choose to seek social media assistance or offer work on a project-basis for Carnival Alaska's digital focus.