Ritter Sport: #LoveIsInTheSquare

Objectives

The campaign's primary objectives were to:

-Reach millions of adults with the #LoveisintheSquare message

-Raise awareness of Ritter Sport as the 'go to' brand for gifting chocolate

-Sell Ritter Delightfuls in Sainsbury's and Tesco's

-Create a co-ordinated campaign using the interactive activation for a paid social media campaign 

The activation in Manchester Piccadilly station (above), where participants would be interviewed by Mrs Christmas (below).

Strategy and Execution

To promote the #LoveIsInTheSquare message we executed a disruptive and unique campaign to grab attention during the busy Christmas period. A brand activation event at Manchester Piccadilly Station was used as content for a paid-for social media campaign over the festive season.

The activation was a cubed installation designed as a giant Delightfuls box with a cosy but contemporary Christmas lounge on the inside. A friendly Mrs Christmas would interview passers-by, who would share their stories to create short video assets to share on social media. 

To encourage interaction with the activation we had two mascots dressed as giant chocolate bars, handing out Ritter Sport 'minis' and pre-qualifying interviewees to find ones who had a good story for the videos. 

From these interviews we created 9 separate 30 second videos utilising these personal stories on the tradition of gift giving to form the digital aspect of the campaign. We used these videos in both organic and paid for social media posts.

Our strategy for this campaign was to:

- Create a disruptive and engaging activation at a major landmark, Manchester Piccadilly train station, to capture content for social media

-Use this content from the activation on social media to spread the #LoveisintheSquare message to as many adults as possible

External factors resulted in logistical issues for the campaign but the Ark Media rose to the occasion and with our contingency planning ensured a successful activation. Protests led to the police banning experiential events in high risk locations on weekends in November, forcing the filming date to be changed.

Being prepared for this eventuality, enabled us to switch the event to a mid-week whilst keeping it at Piccadilly train station ensured there was still high footfall and long dwell times.

Conclusion

Through the combination of a fun, engaging and visually striking activation, a well prepared experiential plan and a considered social media strategy we created a campaign which was a success. The campaign delivered an impact for the client looking to breakthrough into the saturated Christmas gifting market.

#LoveisintheSquare reinforced a Christmas spirit of gratitude and customers related and interacted with its message, posting fantastic user content which was shared widely.