We crafted Stories of the InterContinental life, a first-of-its kind multi-sensory content series comprised of three episodes with three storylines each - Fascination, Empathy, and Worldliness. From NYC to Beijing to London, we interviewed global travelers and shared their experiences and discoveries, using incredible sound, visual language, ambient design to immerse listeners into the adventure. In doing so, we created a way to transport people across the world, in a way that only InterContinental Hotels can make possible. The series included 15-minute Podcasts, online documentary-style films featuring the podcast talent, and illustrated animations to explore the unique storylines and inspire travelers imagination. Our aim was to create content that was genuine, meaningful and personal that would empower new perspectives to make our guests feel more worldly.

In 12 weeks we casted 12 thought leaders, travelled to three continents and cities, produced 53 minutes of audio content, 10 minutes of video and three unique illustrations to bring together our storylines of Fascination, Worldliness and Empathy. All content was unscripted to ensure a natural authenticity – for example we spent the day following Frank Senior (a blind tour guide) around New York City listening and filming how he described fascination through smell, sound and touch. Going live in October, the media plan reflected the unique content formats created, with editorial placements on strong Audio platforms like Wondery, Slate and wNYC. The content was adapted to social platforms Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. And premium content partnerships were selected with The New Yorker, Conde Nast, and YouTube. This generated 22.63MM Impressions, 13.88MM Video Views and over 1MM downloads of the Podcasts in US alone, from October to December 2016.

Top 10% in performance of all US advertising

22.63MM Impressions

13.88MM Video Views

1MM Podcast downloads

The Atlantic described the work as "Selling What They Preach. When InterContinental summons the InterPersonal to sell its hotel rooms . . . what is being invoked is not merely blithe aspiration, cultural ideals fit to be transformed into corporate profits. The ads are, instead, profoundly political. And they are explicitly moral. They are making claims not just about what we should buy, but about what we should be.” (March 23, 2017)