How we are trying to get a slice of the Oprah action

I think it is pretty impressive that Tourism Australia has achieved this marketing coup of bringing Oprah Winfrey to our shores. I know they spend millions on TV advertising around the globe every year, but clearly this is so much more powerful to have Oprah say to her nine million viewers (in 145 countries): “Australia is a great place to hang out”.

Managing Director of Tourism Australia Andrew McEvoy estimates in 2009 “international visitors would have injected around $25 billion in to the Australian economy.”* The international coverage of her visit will be huge as well.

So naturally, RedBalloon wants to get involved with this visit and the RedBallooners are bouncing off the walls with excitement over the idea of sending Oprah on an RedBalloon experience while she’s here.

Okay so I need a hand with this – I pride myself of being a good gift giver (you sort of have to be if you are Australia’s largest online gift retailer) – so there are high expectations when it comes to what I (or the team at RedBalloon) give as a gift. We’ve been in touch with Tourism Australia – and they think it is a fabulous idea to give Oprah Winfrey a RedBalloon experience when she comes here.

We were most pleased that this could be possible – however now we are all a flutter – what do you give Oprah?

We love to give people a good time here at RedBalloon, it’s in our blood, and who better to send on a RedBalloon experience than the woman Vanity Fair once described as having “more influence on the culture than any university, president, politician or religious leader, except perhaps the Pope.”

So clearly RedBalloon want to put it’s best/most appropriate/perfect experience as a gift to her.

What do you suggest we give her?

Imagine giving Oprah the chance to go sky diving over the beach, swimming with whale sharks, snorkelling on the great barrier reef, fly a helicopter over the harbour, learn how to cook an old-fashioned Aussie barbeque or go hot air ballooning! This is our chance to really show what we have got – and why this is a uniquely Australian gift.

We’ve also created a few social media strings to our campaign. We need to demonstrate to Tourism Australia that RedBalloon has the perfect gift, so we’ve created a  public petition to send Oprah on a RedBalloon experience. And of course this is a volume play – we need everyone to show that Oprah does also need to experience a uniquely Australian entrepreneurial success story – so we need people to make their suggestion.

In addition, if you’re on Twitter join in on our hashtag conversation by including the hashtag “#Oprah4redballoon” and then add your favourite RedBalloon experience suggestion, eg. #Oprah4redballoon swimming with sharks or #Oprah4redballoon on an Aboriginal walkabout tour.

Thanks so much for your help with this we’ll let you know how we go!

Naomi Simson is considered one of Australia’s ‘Best Bosses’. She is an employee engagement advocate and practices what she preaches in her own business. RedBalloon has been named as one of only six Hewitt Best Employers in Australia and New Zealand for 2009 and awarded an engagement scorecard of over 90% two years in a row – the average in Australian businesses is 55%. RedBalloon has also been nominated by BRW as being in the top 10 Best Places to Work in Australia behind the likes of Google. One of Australia’s outstanding female entrepreneurs, Naomi regularly entertains as a passionate speaker inspiring people on employer branding, engagement and reward and recognition. Naomi writes a blogand is a published author – and has received many accolades and awards for the business she founded – RedBalloon.com.au.