Insight
Double Robotics wanted to launch its telepresence robot. The device allows a user to manoeuvre the robot from their home or office, and to interact with the world via video and audio devices.
To put it in context, awareness was extremely low. Where normally this would be considered a disadvantage, the team decided to turn this to their advantage by tapping into the fact that customers had no preconceptions of robots. Therefore the territory of robots presented a wonderful opportunity to engender the imagination and interest of customers.
Budget constraints meant that something extraordinary would be required to tell the robot’s story.
The consumer insight was that absolute relevance and absolute entertainment drive fanatacism. Robots ignite the imagination. But they can also lack personality. Atomic 212 recognised the need to create an engaging story surrounding the robot. It needed to ignite the imagination while simultaneously building a story of the robot as a useful, functional … being, if you will. The robot needed a personality. The agency also needed a launch platform that would cost almost nothing, provide powerful positive mass reach and add value to everyone’s experience. Some would say it was asking the impossible.
Strategy
Strategic concept: Give the robot personality, drive massive user generated content and, more importantly, drive massive media generated content.
The agency sought out and identified a positive, almost fanatical, world event of such significance that the eyes of both customers and the media would be focused on it.
Atomic 212 identified the launch of the iPhone 6s and set about developing an idea to add relevance and entertainment to all those fixated on the event. It wanted to piggy-back on the event in a unique way that made consumers and the media welcome the brand, and its robot, to the event. To add a human element, the agency focused its execution on Lucy Kelly, the girl behind the device – she was positioned as a young, energetic, innovative young woman who didn’t want to stand in the wind and torrential rain to wait for an iPhone 6s.
The ‘Lucy the Robot’ campaign was born – Atomic 212 placed the humanoid robot outside the George Street Apple store in Sydney to line up for the global release of the iPhone 6s. It sat in the torrential weather for days and interacted constantly with others in the queue, the media and passers-by. On the other end of the device was Lucy Kelly, who controlled it from her home and office. Lucy drove the device from her office to the Apple store and waited in line (via the robot) for two days.
It took the global hype surrounding the iPhone 6s launch, combined it with cool, new technology, then added a human element – it was a recipe for success. The agency then created compelling content around the story and seeded it across digital.
Execution
With Sydney being the first Apple store to release the iPhone globally, the robot or droid was the first to buy it globally. The story simple was: Robot buys first iPhone 6s in the world. The story was fun, exciting and exceptionally consumer- and media-engaging.
The campaign was driven by branded content marketing and social media. Once the concept had been developed, the agency targeted a number of mainstream publications like news.com.au or The Australian, and television programmes like The Project, as well as well-known technology websites like Mashable. It suspected that if it targeted the right media, there would be a snowball effect where media outlets would end up approaching them. It approached digital, print, radio and television sources. This was the most effective way to satisfy the ‘make us famous’ brief.
The secondary phase came immediately after the mainstream phase – Atomic 212 used the hype surrounding Lucy the Robot to target specific business titles and programmes regarding the practical uses of the device in the workplace.
A microsite was developed to support lead generation and sales which funnelled sales leads, as well as a number of videos and social media profiles into the sales engine. The search marketing push which was driven predominantly by search engine optimisation and backlinks was in support.
Results
“The result represents a new record for a genuine viral marketing campaign both in terms of speed and reach” - Fabiano Destri Lobo, Global Mobile Marketing Association.
1. Reach: The story was covered in 4,000 stories across print and broadcast – including The Australian, Gizmodo, BRW, Seven News, Nine News, The AFR, Mashable. Globally, it was translated into 32 languages, reaching 123 million people in total, with an average frequency of 7. Estimated media value of $73.2m.
2. Sales and leads: 12,452 enquiries generated in 72 hours - $44,777,392 in sales opportunities.
3. Brand: recall +780%; brand favourability +1,200%.
4. Innovation: The Robot was first out of the Apple store - the first iPhone 6s sold was bought by a robot.
As an added benefit the Apple store PR team invited the Robot to be part of its own marketing effort with invitations to a red carpet event, publicity shots and onsite videos.
The results were remarkable by both Australia and global standards and according to the Mobile Marketing Association have set new benchmarks for true, genuine viral media campaigns.