Austria participated in the Eurovision Song Contest in 2011 with the song "The Secret Is Love" written by Thomas Rabitsch and Nadine Beiler. The song was performed by Nadine Beiler. In July 2010, the Austrian broadcaster Österreichischer Rundfunk (ORF) announced that they would be returning to the Eurovision Song Contest after a three-year absence following their withdrawal in 2008. ORF organised the national final Düsseldorf - wir kommen! in order to select the Austrian entry for the 2011 contest in Düsseldorf, Germany. Thirty songs competed in an online voting round titled Guten Morgen Düsseldorf, of which ten were selected to proceed to the national final. The ten songs competed in a televised show where two rounds of public voting selected the winner. The first round selected the top three entries to proceed to the second round, during which "The Secret Is Love" performed by Nadine Beiler was selected as the winner after gaining 46.73% of the votes.
Austria was drawn to compete in the first semi-final of the Eurovision Song Contest which took place on 12 May 2011. Performing during the show in position 2, "The Secret Is Love" was announced among the top 10 entries of the second semi-final and therefore qualified to compete in the final on 14 May. This marked the first time that Austria qualified to the final of the Eurovision Song Contest from a semi-final since the introduction of semi-finals in 2004. It was later revealed that Austria placed seventh out of the 19 participating countries in the semi-final with 69 points. In the final, Austria performed in position 18 and placed eighteenth out of the 25 participating countries, scoring 64 points.
Background
Prior to the 2011 contest, Austria has participated in the Eurovision Song Contest forty-three times since its first entry in . The nation has won the contest on one occasion: in with the song "" performed by Udo Jürgens. Following the introduction of semi-finals for the , Austria has featured in only one final. Austria's least successful result has been last place, which they have achieved on seven occasions, most recently in . Austria has also received nul points on three occasions; in , and 1991.
The Austrian national broadcaster, Österreichischer Rundfunk (ORF), broadcasts the event within Austria and organises the selection process for the nation's entry. Following the 2007 contest, the Austrian broadcaster announced in November 2007 that the country would not participate in 2008 citing poor results in the 2007 contest and declining interest as reasons for their decision. The nation also did not participate in 2009 and 2010, with ORF Head of Entertainment Edgar Böhm stating that the newly introduced semi-final format "still incorporates a mix of countries who will be politically favoured in the voting process". Following their three-year absence, ORF confirmed their intentions to participate at the 2011 Eurovision Song Contest on 27 July 2010. From 2002 to 2005, ORF had set up national finals with several artists to choose both the song and performer to compete at Eurovision for Austria. In 2007, ORF held an internal selection to choose the artist and song to represent Austria at the contest. On 26 October 2010, the broadcaster also announced that the Austrian entry for the 2011 contest would be selected through a national final.
Before Eurovision
Düsseldorf - wir kommen! Düsseldorf - wir kommen! (Düsseldorf - here we come!) was the national final that selected Austria's entry for the Eurovision Song Contest 2011. The competition took place on 25 February 2011 at the ORF Center in Vienna, hosted by Mirjam Weichselbraun and Robert Kratky with Andi Knoll hosting from the green room. The show was broadcast on ORF eins as well as streamed online via ORF's official website and the official Eurovision Song Contest website eurovision.tv. The first part of the national final was watched by 736,000 viewers in Austria with a market share of 26%, while the second part was watched by 818,000 viewers in Austria with a market share of 37%.