2011 Bronze Business to consumer

Client Royal Mail

What is wonderful about this work? Get teens to discover a medium they just don’t know: the letter. Our experiment inspired 200 teens to write love letters. In 30 days, the LolXperiment inspired 21,600 minutes of letter writing, generated 30,000 online comments and video responses, was picked up by BBC Radio and engaged with half a million teens and teachers!

What details of the strategy make this a winning entry? Royal Mail faced a business problem. Today’s young people don’t value letters. Growing up in a digital world, only one in five has ever received a letter, and just one in ten has written one. So how could we show them what the letter can do...? Quite rightly, the law prohibits cold DM to youths. We could’ve created beautifully crafted ads promoting the letter, but our budget wouldn’t even buy an ad in a teen magazine. This generation believe each other before they’ll believe a brand, so we spoke to them in their language, through their media, on their terms, and pitched it as an experiment. Teens embraced the letter as part of their media mix – and over 30 days their response went from ‘laughing out loud’ to ‘loving our letters’!

How did creativity bring the strategy to life? We sent a teaser ‘fan message’ to influential teens. First as a tweet. Next, a Facebook message. And finally, a beautifully handwritten letter! Inside was a message asking which was most moving. If it was the letter, they were to say ‘love letter’ at random in their next vlog/post. They did just that! Next, we inspired 200 young people by posting challenges on YouTube. Word of the experiment spread as friends followed on Twitter and Facebook. As our mailbag filled, we invited young artists across Britain to turn the letters into works of art. At 5.31pm on Valentine’s Day we ran our ad for the letter on livestream TV. We read every letter aloud, to a worldwide audience who asked the hosts to write a song in real time, composed from the most ‘favourited’ letters.

Results Just when everyone thought the letter was history, Royal Mail proved it has a future. With a tiny budget, no celebrities and no paid-for media, the LolXperiment reached half a million teens! Two hundred wrote real love letters, spending a minimum of two hours per letter: 21,600 minutes (15 days and nights). Over 30,000 young people posted comments and hundreds wrote asking for the experiment to be repeated next year. The LolXperiment was even picked up on nationwide BBC and campus radio stations.

Team Caitlin Ryan, Debi Bester, Nina Lindh, Luke Mcclure, Martin Power, Soni Singleton, Chris Monk, Fiona Brown-Hovelt, Ewa Kwolek, Emma Rush.