Wendy’s
pretzel bacon cheeseburger love songs campaign
THE CHALLENGE
Launch Wendy's new Pretzel Bacon Cheeseburger in an already overcrowded market. Prior to the release of its Pretzel Bacon Cheeseburger and Pretzel Love Songs campaign, Wendy’s was struggling to reach millennials. At this point, they had noticed that the younger demographic had shifted its interest from fast-food chains to fast-casual chains such as Chipotle and Panera, and were vying to keep up with the competition. In addition, Wendy’s wanted to reassert its position as one of the industry’s top innovators, and wanted to advertise a product comparable to more unique and upscale items such as their chili and baked potato.
The overall business objective was simple – to achieve a three percent increase in same-restaurant sales by maximizing growth and awareness of the product, allowing Wendy’s to continue to invest in its brand transformation.
SOCIAL MEDIA ENGAGEMENT
the campaign
When Wendy’s launched its new Pretzel Bacon Cheeseburger in test markets, we noticed an enormous volume of positive social media chatter about it. It was an all-out love fest. Seeing the virtual love letters written about the Pretzel Bacon Cheeseburger on Twitter and Facebook during the test market phase, combined with our audience insights, inspired us to promote the Pretzel Bacon Cheeseburger by collecting (and asking for) comments about the product and singing them right back to consumers as a series of music videos: Pretzel Bacon Cheeseburger Love Songs.
Taking an over-the-top, tongue-in-cheek approach to these love songs showed that Wendy’s takes its food very seriously, but not itself. We didn’t give away product or discounts (as is the norm in the industry) but instead gave away “virtual fame" by citing our biggest fans and their comments in our Love Songs. The pure comedic value of the content we created made them highly shareable.
Each week, new tweets and Facebook posts were collected, new love songs were scored, and a new video was produced (five total over 7 weeks) and released online, culminating in a grand finale starring multiplatinum recording artist and boy band balladeer, Nick Lachey. In the end, Pretzel Love Songs became the most engaging and talked about Wendy's campaign in the brand's history.
MY ROLE
Senior Designer. I created and edited campaign visual assets and press materials, as well as ensured brand consistency across all integrated marketing/social channels.
CAMPAIGN VISUALS
THE RESULTS
During the course of the first seven weeks of the Pretzel Love Songs campaign a total of five videos were released, racking up more than 650,000 collective views. When all was said and done, the viral videos had 7.5 million Facebook views and 1.7 billion earned media impressions.
Not only did the campaign reach a broad audience but it also successfully reached its intended audience, acquiring exposure to 93 percent of identified “fast food lovers”. The original goal of three percent same-restaurant sales growth was met, and Wendy’s stock experienced a 31% increase.
Awards
2014 Cannes Silver Lion – Promo & Activation – Use of Social Platform
2014 Cannes Shortlist – Branded Content & Entertainment – Integration of Social Media
2014 Cannes Shortlist – PR-/Retail & Restaurants
2014 Cannes Shortlist – PR /Use of User Generated Content