Building a Marketing Function from the Ground Up: Gullivers Australia
In under two years, I took Gullivers Australia from a business with no dedicated marketing function to one with a new brand, a new eCommerce website, a centralised CRM, marketing reporting and its own owned-media publication. I then handed over a full marketing overview, including a Digital Growth Operating System, so the business had a clear plan for its next phase of growth.
The Scope
| Client | Gullivers Australia, a Sydney-based group travel company with more than 40 years in sport, school and corporate travel |
|---|---|
| My role | Head of Marketing (consultant engagement) |
| Timeframe | November 2024 to September 2026 |
| Scope | Strategic branding brief, end-to-end rebrand, eCommerce website, content strategy, email marketing strategy, campaign marketing, marketing strategy and brand governance |
| Deliverables | Full rebrand; new website with eCommerce and search; content system (the Passion & Pursuit Journal); Gullivers Corporate rebrand and launch; Marketing Overview and Digital Growth Operating System |
The Challenge
Gullivers had decades of trust with schools, sporting bodies and supporter communities. It didn't have a marketing function to match.
- 01
No marketing function
Marketing was a caretaker task sitting with a business development role, with no central ownership of brand, digital or campaigns.
- 02
A fragmented digital presence
Part of the team started building its own separate website, which would have left one brand running two disconnected sites.
- 03
Untapped customer relationships
Email marketing had no strategy for capture, automation or segmentation. Lists were small, largely inactive and spread across legacy systems.
- 04
No growth engine
There was no consistent top of funnel, limited organic search presence and a reliance on paid and rented channels.
- 05
High friction in the customer journey
Booking a Gullivers tour meant enquiring and waiting: there was no online search, no eCommerce and no clear path from interest to purchase.
I was first engaged to support the rebrand. As the scale of the work became clear, the role grew into leading the whole marketing function.
The Approach
I built in phases, foundations first.
- Phase 1
Foundations
Brand, website, CRM, reporting and in-house marketing processes.
- Phase 2
Optimise
Review performance, implement priorities and deepen understanding of what customers want from each vertical.
- Phase 3
Growth
Scale measurable commercial return through growth pathways and AI tools that enhance the customer experience.
I worked with a lean, hand-picked team: a fractional CMO, a brand identity design agency, a web agency, an in-house senior graphic and UI designer, a copywriter, a videographer, an animation specialist and a Meta ads specialist. I briefed, managed and connected all of them while still delivering day-to-day marketing across every vertical.
Brand: Passion led experiences
I planned and delivered the Gullivers rebrand over 12 months.
Research and brief
With the co-owner, I interviewed key stakeholders and built the agency brief, including a SWOT analysis, research, positioning statements and a summary of the existing brand identity.
Identity
I worked with agency John + John and our senior designer to deliver a fresh visual identity, with brand guidelines completed in June 2026.
Governance
I introduced a marketing and design policy and a single request process, so every customer-facing piece came through one channel and stayed on brand.
Rollout
I rebranded every touchpoint, from product pages and sales collateral to email and social.
One group
In May 2026, I rebranded and launched the corporate travel division as Gullivers Corporate (formerly Locale Travel Management), bringing the group together under one name.
Website: A new era: Group booking engine
I led the rebuild of gullivers.com.au and consolidated the planned events site into one platform for events, sport, schools, culinary.
Planning
The fractional CMO, our UI and UX designer and I mapped the architecture, sitemap and wireframes in a full-day workshop in August 2025.
Built lean and fast
Stage 1 was delivered in four months (with Christmas in between) as a custom WordPress build, launching in March 2026. It cost considerably less than any other quote we received.
eCommerce for the first time
Selected tours could be booked and paid for online, a first for Gullivers.
Built to convert
The new site came with search and filtering, mobile optimisation, clearer pathways to enquire or book, and HubSpot integration for every enquiry.
Built for content
The site was designed to carry articles and storytelling that bring new customers into the Gullivers ecosystem.
Content Strategy: The Passion & Pursuit Journal
I built Gullivers its own owned-media publication. The Passion & Pursuit Journal tells the stories of the coaches, teachers, sporting figures and tour hosts who travel with Gullivers, because nobody sells a tour quite like someone who's just come home from one.
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Real stories
Tour stories told by the people who led them, from Daramalan College's rugby tour to Japan and Caulfield Grammar's music tours to the Newcastle Cricket Academy's cricket tour of England.
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Interviews
Podcast and written interviews with sporting tour hosts and culinary tour leaders: the people guests actually travel with.
-
Travel guides
Shelley Craft (The Block) and former Benetton player Christian Sergiacomi on the Veneto they know, written to support the Queensland Reds supporter tour to Treviso.
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Thought leadership for B2B buyers
I wrote Behind Every Great Tour Is a Plan, which walks school and club decision-makers through the 18-month planning timeline. I also wrote a feature on sports and travel partnerships, with insights from the Queensland Reds' commercial lead.
-
One story, every channel
Each article was written once and put to work everywhere, repurposed into email, LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook content.
Campaigns, email and lead generation
Integrated campaigns that sell out
I led an integrated campaign for the Wallabies v Pumas tour to Argentina, combining organic, paid and contra media. The tour sold out, and close to half of its conversions came from the Meta campaign.
Media contra
I helped secure a contra deal that swapped British & Irish Lions tickets for media with News, Nine and Time Out. We used it across 2025 and 2026 campaigns.
Email marketing
I ran Gullivers’ email marketing in HubSpot and built the brand’s email templates myself. I also wrote a six-month email strategy to fix audience quality, scale and engagement in sequence.
CRM and reporting
Working with our fractional CMO, we consolidated around 5,800 contacts into HubSpot. We also set up a Looker Studio dashboard, giving Gullivers its first marketing attribution baseline from July 2026.
Schools marketing operating system
I built a relationship-first schools strategy, with a six-stage funnel, a seven-channel plan, cold calling playbooks, LinkedIn Lead Gen Forms and a digital flipbook brochure concept.
Commercial discipline
I identified the need for a product viability check and commissioned the Product Traffic Light System. It sat alongside go-to-market and partnership evaluation frameworks developed with our fractional CMO.
The handover: a plan for the next phase
In August 2026, I delivered a full Marketing Overview of the function: every system, framework, resource and priority, with links to the work behind each one.
At its centre is the Digital Growth Operating System, a strategic content engine that puts owned content at the heart of growth across owned, earned, rented and paid media. It sets out Year 1 targets:
- 52journal articles
- 15,000+monthly website visits
- 4,000 to 10,000database subscribers
- 20%of enquiries touching journal content
- A costed Year 1 budget of around $60,000
- Clear roles and accountability, including a Digital Growth Coordinator role
- A plan for AI search (GEO), so Gullivers is found where travel decisions increasingly begin
It gave Gullivers a clear plan for delivery as it enters its next phase of growth.
What they said
“Kellie built our marketing function from the ground up, delivering a new brand, a new website, our first centralised CRM and the Passion & Pursuit Journal. She then handed over a full marketing overview, including a Digital Growth Operating System with a strategic content engine and a clear plan for delivery as Gullivers enters its next phase of growth.”
Kevin MaloneyExecutive Chairman, Tulla Group (owner of Gullivers Australia)
“Overall, I think Kellie has done a lot with very little. Some of the content she has produced are better than what I see from much larger travel businesses with significantly bigger marketing teams and budgets.”
Dwayne BirtlesFractional CMO to Gullivers and former CMO of TripADeal
What this means for your business
Gullivers shows what I do best: I walk into a visitor-experience business with real heritage and untapped potential, build the marketing function it needs, and leave it with a clear plan to keep growing.
If you run a tourism, travel, wellness or events business, I can help with:
- Integrated marketing campaigns that carry through the whole guest journey, from booking to arrival, the experience itself and the return home
- Brand, website and CRM foundations that a lean team can run
- Owned content engines that build authority and turn your customers’ stories into demand, and convert conversations into bookings, through optimising your biggest opportunity and building a lasting trust asset.
Ready to build yours? Get in touch for a conversation about where your marketing experience is today and where it could go.
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