From Views to Bookings: The ‘Greatest Performance’ Strategy by a&o x TikTok
Summary
Bengt Graper (TikTok Brand Partnership Manager, Travel & Mobility) and Thomas Hertkorn (Head of Online Marketing, a&o Hostels) presented the strategy behind a&o's TikTok Ad Award 2025 win in the 'Greatest Performance' category — beating out competitors including Media Markt, Zalando, and Vodafone. The session covered a&o's full TikTok journey from March 2024 through ITB Berlin 2025, delivering a candid, data-rich account of what worked, what failed, and how assumptions were repeatedly proved wrong.
Graper opened with platform context: TikTok has evolved from a family-and-friends app (3.5 years ago) into the top source for new travel inspiration, overtaking traditional word-of-mouth and Google reviews. Nearly 70% of TikTok users report discovering a new travel destination in the past year, and one in three did so within the last 3 months. More than 50% of users now search for travel content at least once per week, and one in four searches within 30 seconds of opening the app. Tourism-related search content on TikTok grew approximately 100% year-over-year in 2024.
Thomas Hertkorn described how a&o initially entered TikTok as a branding 'playground' tied to a YouTube-first brand campaign, not expecting performance returns. Within one month, the channel generated €100K in direct revenue — a result that reshaped their investment thesis. A key early win came from TikTok's Smart+ AI campaign tool: with a €10K initial budget, they generated €35K in revenue within two weeks (3.5x ROAS). Scaling the budget to €40K over two months yielded €200K in revenue. For full-year 2024 (starting March), a&o generated €750K in real, verified revenue from TikTok — Thomas was explicit that this was actual revenue, not platform-reported attribution figures.
Creative strategy evolved dramatically. Early creatives repurposed from YouTube — including a staged shot of a bunk bed in front of the Brandenburg Gate — underperformed. The team shifted to TikTok One, TikTok's built-in creator marketplace, where creators apply to brand projects and are compensated via a revenue share on ad spend rather than upfront fees. Using this model, a&o produced 100+ videos rapidly. Key creative learnings: destination-focused content outperformed hotel-focused content; shorter formats worked better; female creators generated more views and reach while male creators drove higher conversion performance (reason unknown); and an AI-generated song produced for the YouTube campaign was repurposed on TikTok by inviting creators to use it freely — spawning diverse, high-performing organic-style content beyond expected dance trends.
A major audience discovery upended a&o's assumptions: their highest-converting TikTok segment was not Gen Z. While 37% of their audience was Gen Z, 32% was older, 21% was ages 35–44, and the age group with the highest ROAS was 45+. Within Gen Z, the dominant new customer profile was 18–24-year-old females booking solo travel at the last minute (same-day bookings), drawn by a&o's female-only dorms and double rooms — a segment the brand had not intentionally targeted. A second unexpected segment was teachers, who use TikTok actively; a&o created content with teacher creators to reach school group bookers, which Thomas described as a significant success.
Operational challenges included billing issues, campaigns stopping unexpectedly, and a complete UI/UX overhaul from TikTok within a 4-week period. Thomas credited TikTok's direct support team as a differentiator vs. other platforms. He repeatedly emphasized abandoning strategy in favor of testing: 'Start easy and lean. 5K budget is completely fine. Start with the lowest budget you can think of.' His closing numbers: current ROAS of 17 on paid campaigns with zero educational content — only performance-focused creatives.
Key Takeaways
- •a&o Hostels generated €750K in verified direct revenue from TikTok in under 10 months (March–December 2024) with a team of just 3 in-house staff, winning TikTok Ad Award 2025 for 'Greatest Performance' against Zalando, Vodafone, and Media Markt.
- •TikTok Smart+ (fully AI-driven campaign) delivered 3.5x ROAS on first test: €10K budget generated €35K revenue in 2 weeks; scaling to €40K over 2 months produced €200K revenue.
- •Current paid campaign ROAS at a&o is 17, achieved with zero educational or informational content — exclusively performance-focused creatives targeting direct bookings.
- •Nearly 70% of TikTok users discovered a new travel destination on the platform in the past year; 1 in 3 did so in the last 3 months; tourism search content grew ~100% YoY on TikTok in 2024.
- •More than 50% of TikTok users search for travel content at least once per week, with 1 in 4 searching within 30 seconds of opening the app — positioning TikTok as a direct competitor to Google for travel intent.
- •The highest ROAS age group for a&o on TikTok was 45+, not Gen Z; only 37% of their converting audience was Gen Z, while 21% were ages 35–44 — directly contradicting the common assumption that TikTok is a Gen Z-only platform.
- •Unexpected top customer segment: 18–24-year-old females booking same-day solo travel, attracted by a&o's female-only dorms and double rooms — a segment the brand had not previously identified or targeted.
- •TikTok One (in-platform creator marketplace) allowed a&o to produce 100+ native videos with no upfront creator fees; creators are compensated via revenue share on ad spend, dramatically lowering content production costs.
- •Destination-focused content significantly outperformed hotel-focused content; female creators drove more views and reach while male creators drove higher conversion — an unexpected gender performance asymmetry with no clear explanation.
Transcript
We're going to share now the best practice of ANO host with Tik Tok brand partnership manager automotive travel and mobility. So not only travel right at Tik Tok bankruper and then we have the head of online marketing at an host Tomas Horn and he's going to share all the insights he can share with you for you to master Tik Tok as well. I'm super excited. Thank you and the stage is yours. Thank >> Thank you. Yeah, hello everyone. Um, thanks for making it and even with the problems, luckily we are...
