When the pandemic hit in early 2020, there was probably no worse business to be in than travel. But that is exactly where today's guest found himself during that very bizarre spring of 2020.

Leigh Barnes is the Chief Customer Officer at Intrepid Travel, a global travel and tours company, born in Australia, that has over the last 30 years, built a very significant business, one that is fast approaching a billion dollars in annual revenue.

Staring into the abyss that was, not actually knowing when travel would return, Leigh and his team took the Covid-era mantra of “never waste a good crisis” to heart, and drastically shifted their marketing strategy and budget away from performance marketing and into PR, storytelling and top of funnel brand building. The basic idea? Build a brand that travellers would want to engage and connect with, even if they couldn't travel.

A couple of years on, and the results are pretty astonishing. Branded searches and traffic are up 40% and direct bookings, as opposed to bookings via third party travel agents, have risen from 20% to 60% which means Intrepid is a far more profitable business today, than it was pre-pandemic when it was, in Leigh's own words, addicted to the short-term hamster wheel of PPC and paid marketing.

Leigh is a brilliant storyteller and this episode is packed with tons of valuable nuggets and insights that will help any consumer marketer understand how to balance long term brand building with short term promotions and activations.

I hope you enjoy the show.

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