When the horror ends, the holidays begin - but not everyone is thrilled about that. Are you #TeamHalloween or #TeamHolidays?
The objective of this social marketing campaign was to bring Universal fans together by celebrating both the Halloween Horror Nights and Holidays at Universal communities together in a festive, silly, inclusive manner at the intersection of Halloween and the holidays. The aim was to create a unique and memorable experience that resonated with each audience by creating a video with two endings depending on which the user liked better: halloween or the holidays
In the past, we had done videos like Santa VS HHN and Earl the Squirrel VS HHN, but we updated the strategy in order to find a new dynamic and creative way to reach our two unique audiences - both having a love of the Universal brand but specific affinities for Halloween or Holidays. We needed a way for both groups to be celebrated while marking the end of Halloween and the beginning of the holidays. Through the creative brief process, the rap battle with two endings was developed as a win-win for each audience. During planning, however, we ran into issues with budget. We had to get creative. Enter the NYC streets, Universal Team Members, and on nutty character.
The execution of the Halloween Versus Holidays Rap Battle involved enlisting the help of our Universal Entertainment team, the folks you'd see providing entertainment around the park and engaging with guests, to recuite talent that could perform the rap battle. Next, we needed characters to represent Holidays and Halloween, so the team picked on a member of our Halloween Horror Nights Chainsaw Horde (don't worry, no one was executed during our execution phase, and Earl the Squirrel, our mascot for the holidays. For the crowd, we filled the camera frame full of our employees from all around the business. From Comms Planning to Compliance, Team Members from all areas came out to support our efforts to support the fans with an awesome piece of content.
By the numbers, the campaign had a respectable +1M Engagements, +500K Impressions and +11K Engagements, but for a campaign like this where we are celebrating superfans of the brand, the goal is less about reach and more on sentiment. The fans loved the way we celebrate each fandom and we could measure that through the positive sentiment we saw. It wasn't Halloween or the Holidays that won the day, but the fans.
