Northern Rivers Rail Trail Supporters Campaign
"LINK THE PLACES WE LOVE"
Building Community Momentum for the Trail Completion
The brief
The Northern Rivers Rail Trail Supporters campaign needed to build community awareness and advocacy for completing the Rail Trail, generating public support for the project while growing a supporter base that could be mobilised for future advocacy, including the lead-up to the March 2027 State Election.
Our response
We delivered an integrated marketing campaign spanning organic social media, paid social advertising, public relations, email marketing and out-of-home advertising. The strategy combined community-focused storytelling, local business voices, economic impact and campaign milestones, with targeted paid activity across the Northern Rivers, South-East Queensland and the Mid North Coast to drive petition sign-ups and grow the supporter database.
Performance
Following the implementation of the new strategy and marketing assets:
- Paid social: 134,150 impressions, 64,219 people reached, 4,383 website clicks, 3.27% CTR and $0.27 CPC — outperforming tourism industry benchmarks (2.29% CTR, $0.70 CPC)
- Organic social: 513,037 views, 33,768 engagements and 321 net new followers
- Email: 21.9% average open rate and 6.5% average click rate across 17 sends
- Out of home: 588,035 plays across 29 panels, plus a free billboard placement generating a further 9,414 plays
- Total media value: $80,000–$100,000 delivered against $11,440 in media investment
Outcome
The campaign successfully established strong awareness of the Rail Trail across the Northern Rivers and beyond, while building a highly engaged, substantially larger supporter community. With proven creative assets, audience insights and a strong public support base now in place, the campaign is well positioned to maintain "always-on" momentum through Phase Two and scale activity ahead of the March 2027 State Election.
