Hero image for the campaign showing a dramatic, sun-drenched mountain range meeting the sea, with the text "Discover Unseen Japan".

JAPAN NATIONAL TOURISM ORGANIZATION
Unseen Japan

Amplifying awareness of regional Japan

Creative strategy, creative concept, design, development, influencer and campaign management for a national campaign that resulted in 17 million campaign impressions.

Promotional banner for the "Unseen Japan" campaign featuring a traditional wooden temple on a sunny hillside overlooking a vast mountain valley.

How most Australian travellers saw Japan

When it comes to Japan, young Aussie travellers were only familiar with neon-lit cities and postcard attractions. But there is actually a whole other side to Japan. A side of wild regions with endless wonder waiting to be discovered.

A Buddhist monk walking down stone steps of a traditional temple surrounded by tall cedar trees, with the "Welcome to Unseen Japan" logo and JNTO branding.

Uncovering more of Japan

We were tasked to create a social media campaign that would raise awareness about regional Japan, make people rethink about what a holiday in Japan could look like, and drive them to venture off the beaten path and into Unseen Japan.

Three vertical panels showing regional Japan: a snow-covered traditional village, a man sitting on a mountain bench, and a hiker standing on a snowy peak.

The creative idea: personalised regional trips

Our target audience craves individuality. They’re also digitally savvy and highly inquisitive. Using this insight, we set out to create a digital experience that would allow them to explore and plan personalised trips to regional Japan that would be completely unique from their peers, providing them with cultural immersion and social kudos. Photos by Tyson Mayr @tysontravel

A collage of three winter travel scenes: a snow-capped mountain ridge, a close-up of a person petting a reindeer in the snow, and a traveler standing on drift ice under a clear blue sky.

Execution: Amplifying Unseen Japan

To amplify awareness for the regions of Setouchi, Tohoku, Hokkaido and Kyushu, we enlisted four prominent social media influencers. They were tasked to showcase the region’s sights and attractions with rich photo and video content on Instagram. The influencers also promoted our campaign hashtag #unseenjapan. Photos by Lauren Bath @laurenepbath

Close-up of the "Unseen Japan" digital interface showing a map with pins on Hokkaido, Tohoku, Setouchi, and Kyushu, alongside instructions for a social media contest to win flights.

Bringing it all together

To harness our rich source of inspirational content, we built a campaign page featuring an interactive map of Japan. This coincided with our influencer trips to regional Japan. As the influencers posted what they discovered on Instagram, this appeared on our map in real time, giving users a chance to follow in their footsteps and explore the four regions of Japan.

A responsive design showcase displaying the campaign website on a desktop, tablet, and smartphone, featuring an interactive map of Japan and influencer photography.

Sparking further engagement

We created a unique Instagram competition where users could enter by simply commenting on any Instagram post from the map with ‘Add to #myunseenjapan’. Our winner picked up 2x return flights to Japan to discover the beauty of regional Japan in person.

A stylised, illustrated map of Japan with red location pins across different regions, set against a traditional wash-painting style background with cherry blossoms.

A concept well ahead of its time

Instagram hashtag technology was also used in an innovative way to help users create their own dream Japan travel itinerary. More than just a competition entry, leaving the comment ‘Add to #myunseenjapan’ also added that experience to an Unseen Japan bucket list that users could download for their next Japanese holiday.

Results

0million
campaign impressions
0
Growth on social media
0
unique entries
0
comments generated
0
+ engagements
0
unique visitors to the site
0+ minutes
average time per session