Inspiration
illiterate ads | pepco
The Romanian government invests the least in education out of any EU country. As a result, six out of ten children in rural areas are functionally illiterate by age 14. Pepco addressed the issue with Illiterate Ads - a Twitter campaign written by kids and filled with mistakes that used illiteracy to fight illiteracy.
mission whopper | burger king
What started out as a Call of Duty promotion organically grew into a Burger King phenomenon across the entire gaming world. The brand asked Call of Duty teams to rename their members, each after the ingredients of a Whopper. If the team won the game with the team rankings in the correct order of ingredients when building a Whopper and shared it on social media, the team earned free burgers. Soon, teams playing across numerous games on all platforms started doing the same thing, turning thousands of scoreboards across the world's most popular games into media for the Whopper.
Unhashtagged places | renault
Argentina isa country full of places to explore. However, when it comes to travelling, everyone goes to the same old places. This generates over-tourism and feeds algorithms that lead even more people there. So, Renault used the power of algorithms to develop a platform where you could find unexplored destinations all around the country the remain hashtag free and that you can only get on with a 4WD.
Airplane celebration | transavia
Transavia decided to give a treat to football fans by offering them the chance to win tickets to see their favourite team play at home. How? They created a challenge called #AirplaneCelebration, which was aimed at video gamers. The challenge allowed gamers to perform a virtual airplane celebration after scoring a goal, which would take them to the city of their favorite team.To enter the contest, gamers were required to celebrate their goals in their favorite video game with an airplane celebration, take a screenshot, and share the image on Twitter. The only requirement was that the destination was served by Transavia, which offers over 120 destinations in France, Europe, and the Mediterranean basin.
Flipvertising | Samsung
For the launch of its flagship smartphone, technology manufacturer Samsung created a digital campaign that played on the format of targeted advertising, encouraging Australians to seek out particular YouTube ads for a chance to win a Galaxy Z Flip 4. The Flipvertising campaign was an online scavenger hunt, whereby people had to ‘trick’ their Google Search algorithm by viewing certain Samsung-based content, and so get served a winning ad on YouTube.
The Heinzjack | Heinz
Football fans were scouring Doha for Heinz – not the ketchup brand, but an ordinary man named Thomas Heinz who was offering those who find him under the hashtag #FindHeinz exclusive merchandise along with a grand prize worth QR 10,000. Thomas Heinz was able to attend the biggest event in football on behalf of the brand with this cheeky yet impactful stunt that is taking over the conversation and making noise during a season in which brands are vigorously competing to get noticed. Rather than spending on traditional advertising, Heinz Arabia turned to the social community and found one of the thousands of people named Heinz who can wear their name inside the stadium, and around the event premises in Doha, Qatar.
adopt a stray | Fresh Step
Launched the morning after the 2023 Met Gala, the brand’s ‘Adoptable Gala’ campaign aims to promote pet adoption. To help advocate for the 3.2 million cats who enter animal shelters nationwide each year, Fresh Step has created digital replicas of real cats who are currently up for adoption atBest Friends lifesaving shelters. During the Adopt a Stray events, partner gaming influencers use the adoptable cat avatars while playing Stray and have more information about these cats that can be adopted. Viewers and participants were able to use the chat function on Twitch and YouTube to see real photos and learn about the adoptable cats.
never done evolving feat serena | Nike
Two days after Serena Williams announced her retirement, Nike released a year-long study in the form of avatars, which showcased her commitment to staying on the top of her game for over two decades. After analysing all data and footage from official tournaments throughout her career, machine learning was used to model her playing style across different eras. To make it accessible to everyone, they turned the study into a live virtual match. It starred 17-year-old Serena, the age she was when she won her first Grand Slam, against 35-year-old Serena, the age she was when she won her 23rd Grand Slam.
Climate Realism | wwf
The climate crisis is changing the reality of our lives. The digital exhibition "Climate Realism" vividly shows how much. Could a Monet of the future still paint water lilies or a Van Gogh his famous wheat fields in the year 2100? With the help of artificial intelligence, we have adapted classic paintings to various future scenarios. We all decide whether it remains art or becomes reality.
undercover | women helping women
Studies show that the vast majority of abusive incidents have one thing in common: a few very specific verbal insults tend to be shouted by perpetrators. Women Helping Women Asia trained its AI to recognise these key phrases in Cantonese as well as English spoken with a Cantonese accent. When they are detected, the app secretly starts recording the entire incident that follows, helping victims collect evidence against their abusers. If the AI determines the incident is escalating, an emergency alert is sent to a pre-determined trusted contact, allowing family or friends to intervene.
A.I. Ketchup | heinz
Heinz had to know – what does A.I. think ketchup looks like? It turns out that just like humans, A.I. prefers Heinz.
After using advanced image generator DALL-E 2 to search for everything from “ketchup scuba diving” to “ketchup in outer space”, they found that a lot of the results looked just like bottles of Heinz. Heinz fans got involved by sharing their own suggestions for ketchup image prompts, with the best ones being turned into social posts and print ads, helping them to create the first ever ad campaign with visuals generated entirely by artificial intelligence.
#blackownedfriday | Google
Teaming up with Google and the US Black Chambers, Inc to co-opt Black Friday, the biggest shopping moment of the year, means flipping the focus (and funnel massive amounts of spending) towards small Black-Owned businesses and creating an initiative to promote real change. And with the debut of the ‘Black-Owned’ badge on Google Search and Maps, it couldn’t have been easier for people to find them.
Reaching the unreachables | Netflix
Mediahub was tasked with launching season three of Black Mirror on Netflix. Their target - 25–34 tech savvy hardcore sci-fi fans - was highly skilled in avoiding advertising. In fact, more than two-thirds of them had ad blockers installed on one or more devices, creating a steep challenge. By using a first-to-market media hack that circumvented ad-blocking software, they built a creative directly into the CMS so it wouldn’t be flagged by ad blockers upon page load. The result was a piece of native content with a message as unsettling as the series itself.
accept real cookies | piraque
People have been accepting cookies on the internet for as long as they can remember. A very boring, tedious, and tasteless imposition that got even worse after the latest update of the LGPD. To launch its new chocolate cookies, Piraquê, the most original cookie brand in Brazil, did something about it: the very first “Accept Cookies” button that gives real chocolate cookies when you click on it.
Whatscook | Hellmann's
The mayonnaise brand launched WhatsCook in Brazil, a campaign that provides instant recipes and cooking advice from pro chefs via the popular WhatsApp messaging service.
Momconnect | national department of health
MomConnect is a South African National Department of Health initiative which aims to support maternal health through the use of cell phone based technologies such as WhatsApp and SMS. The services are free to the user, and messages are available in all our 11 official languages. MomConnect sends SMS/WhatsApp messages to pregnant women and caregivers of children under two years. The messages are targeted based on the developmental stage of the child. Caregivers can also contact a help desk with childcare questions via SMS/WhatsApp. There are 814,000 caregivers receiving MomConnect messages in South Africa, and the number is growing daily. Since its inception, MomConnect has had over two million users in total.
virtual heineken silver | Heineken
Heineken has become one of the latest brands to join the rapidly expanding collection of big-name brands with a footprint in the metaverse with the launch of Heineken Silver – the world’s first Virtual Beer.
Can I get a uhhhhh | McDonald's
Decision fatigue happens everywhere to everyone, as is the premise of McDonald's 2022 Super Bowl commercial. Available on YouTube, the ad is called "Can I Get Uhhhhhhhhhhhh" and nods to the universal experience of pulling up to the drive-thru speaker and having absolutely no idea what to feed your growling stomach. The fast food chain updated its Twitter bio to a very long "uhh", and repurposed creative assets across Facebook, Instagram and TikTok to accompany the video drop.
Pasta playlist timer | barilla x spotify
Barilla teamed up with Spotify to ensure their fans will always get their pasta cooked to their liking by curating a number of playlists that pair up with a type of noodle. The idea is that once your pot of water is boiling, you'll add the pasta into the water, press play on the corresponding playlist, and will listen to it all the way through. When the playlist is done, that means your pasta is done too.
The Ad Break Championship - GTI Hijack | volkswagen
In Australia, car brands are the second biggest advertisers on TV. The launch of the new Golf GTI needed to stand out, so the brand hijacked the entire ad break and turned a 30-second ad into a three-minute live gaming platform. Using a QR code, people could launch an in-browser racing game via their phones and race live against other people for the duration of the ad break. The campaign extended to OOH, digital and social.
REST TOWNS | AAMI
To combat high accident rates in rural Australian towns, AAMI used smart data to help turn boring rest stops into Rest Towns. In partnership with Instagram, Spotify, Waze and TikTok, they safely connected in real-time, combining geo, time and in-car targeting, using local incentives based on drivers’ interests. A dynamic data-driven road safety initiative that gives young drivers good reasons to rest every two hours.
Heinz Bottleneck | Heinz Ketchup
Heinz Ketchup is famous for its slow-pouring ketchup. You know what else goes slow? Summer traffic. So, Heinz is doing something about that. Through a partnership with Waze and Burger King, Heinz rewarded people who got stuck driving at the same speed as their ketchup - (0.045km/h) - satisfying their taste buds with Heinz Ketchup and an Impossible™ Whopper from Burger King.
the no show room | volkswagen
Somewhere in the snowy north of Sweden, a brand-new four-wheel drive Passat has been hidden in the middle of nowhere in Volkswagen's scavenger hunt: The No Show Room. Volkswagen dropped clues in various locations, and the campaign included TV spots in which members of the Swedish ski team are seen passing by the secret showroom. This campaign started with an Instagram post, and further exploded into digital billboards, web experiences and even voicemail messages - turning it into a full 360 campaign.
the unfiltered history tour | vice world news
The Unfiltered History Tour is a tour of the British Museum carried out via Instagram filters by making use of Augmented Reality that the internet is no stranger to. However, instead of adding dog ears to a selfie, the same technology was re-engineered to scan and identify life-sized 3D artefacts in differing light conditions throughout the day, to unfilter centuries of colonial narrative.
take away your take away | mcdonald's
Realising its contribution to the litter issue in Norway, McDonald's released a campaign highlighting the ugly side of its famous packaging and encourages its takeaway customers to use the bins it provides.
Promoting the message “Take away your takeaway,” its TV campaign takes inspiration from a moment in Academy Award-winning film American Beauty, where a plastic bag blows in the wind. The campaign then extended to OOH and digital (Instagram) - where they removed all of their grid's content, and replaced it with litter-filled creative.
Golden oven | Mccain
The McCain Golden Oven flipped the script on the most hated ad format – YouTube pre-roll ads. In order to reach their audience, they created a first-ever YouTube-first campaign where you can win by simply sticking around to watch their ad.
The First whatsapp bar in the world | jameson
Jameson wanted to raise awareness of St. Patrick’s Festival – the annually held friendship party – and increase customer registration in its database. Friends get together in bars. But, more often, they get together someplace else: on WhatsApp. So they combined both.
Stories Ordering | Burger King
The fast-food chain was able to create a burger customisation tool on Instagram using the platform’s poll feature, which sits within its Stories function. Burger King created nine separate Stories, one for each element of the Whopper burger. Within each story was a poll that gave users a choice between certain ingredients. If a user completed the polls within all nine Stories, they received a direct message with a coupon to collect their free custom Whopper at any Burger King restaurant. The Stories Ordering campaign was affordable to produce and required no media investment.
angry tweets | burger king
After 15 years of absence, Burger King was back in France with new restaurants opening every month. But after all the waiting, customers got impatient and started to trash-talk Burger King on Twitter. Instead of ignoring this growing problem, Burger King decided to turn this negative atmosphere into a positive tactical opportunity for the brand.
Swipe night | tinder
In an effort to re-captivate users, match daters in new ways, and ultimately make swiping great again, Tinder introduced Swipe Night. The Swipe Night story is a first-person, apocalyptic adventure where at key turning points, Tinder members decide what happens to them next. And their choices dictate more than just the story; they also impact who they match with and what they will chat about once the epic journey ends.
#Makehappinessza | coca-cola
For Coca-Cola's 100th birthday, they created a campaign that spread happiness on social media by tracking conversations with Social Listening tools and leveraging Community Management efforts. They looked at the various moments where people could make happiness happen for others, like birthdays, weddings, anniversaries, friendships, romance, pets, family, holidays and funny moments. Coca-Cola then prepared over 115 unique messages and illustrated posts that their digital team could update on the fly with the person’s name and respond to them with personalised messages from Coca-Cola using #MakeHappinessZA.
#secondlifepasta | barilla
Barilla tackled wasted pasta for World Pasta Day 2022 through the use of TikTok. Pasta is the most loved food in the world, yet it is also one of the most wasted. But thanks to an Italian tradition and to some amazing TikTokers, they turned pasta leftovers into new delicious dishes.