2014 Silver Best Digital Destination

Client Unilever Simple

Team Steven Bennett-Day - Executive Creative Director, Will Kruger - Head of Design, Sean Brennan - Agency Producer, Mark Jenkins - Head of Planning, Lauren McIlroy - Lead Planner, Lee Thomas - Head of Digital Content Strategy, Ed Hardy - Content Creative Strategist, Jo Boyden - Managing Partner, Victoria King - Account Director, Jacqueline Koutoumas - Account Director, Sophie Everett - Copywriter

How did the campaign make a difference? Simple®’s challenge was to initiate a relationship with non-customers around a subject they weren’t connected to. The abundance of content online meant we had to fit in to stand out – the solution had to feel effortless but exciting.

Simple® took a risk and explored their ‘home’, Tumblr.

By tailoring content and listening to what their audience wanted, Simple® have earned the right to play a part in their daily routine – not just what they do online but how they tackle their skin too.

A new channel was developed, where compelling content inspired the first positive conversation around skincare for teens.

Strategy Simple® didn’t just have a brand awareness problem, it had a category problem. The campaign needed to shift the audience’s embarrassed, ‘when I really have to’ approach to skincare and position Simple® as the sensitive skin experts with the expertise to help them achieve naturally healthy-looking skin.

Simple® needed to go somewhere it could listen and start a new conversation without seeming like it was intruding in their customers’ world. Insight identified teens fleeing from the likes of Facebook onto new channels – so the brand had to take a chance in a new space it hadn’t previously considered.

‘Skin Social’ was created on Tumblr – written by teens, led by key influencers and powered by Simple®. The audience was led there by influencers and carefully targeted messages via pre-roll on YouTube.

Creativity To create appropriate content, Simple® again turned to teens for inspiration – finding that their language and communication was largely visual and they needed to experience benefit NOW.

By monitoring unstructured data, the brand learned the topics the audience liked, the type of creative they responded to and the type of content that worked – enabling the campaign to tell the Simple® story in the way the audience wanted.

Filters let the user select content for a tailored user experience on any device. Entertaining and educational GIFs were created that could be consumed in bitesize chunks. Tone of voice was conversational, exciting and snappy. Product content was linked back to the brand site to facilitate purchase, but genuine advice was served up in the language teens appreciated, showing that the brand genuinely wanted to help rather than just flog product.

Results The bespoke Tumblr site has become a digital platform that works for both audience and brand – exceeding all KPIs. It has engaged a wealth of new visitors, with one in three making the effort to return and engage further with content.

Paid media also supported the campaign to drive reach and awareness of Skin Social, contributing to engagement across the site. This was extremely high across video views, CTR on companion banners to display videos and number of viewers watching 100% of the video.

Videos related to Skin Social had an impressive thumbs up 99%.

The campaign has taken the holistic Simple® approach to sensitive skincare, found and engaged a difficult new audience with valuable interactions and positioned the brand to talk about lifestyle with a meaning far beyond product.