As part of a larger campaign supporting the taste of Silk Almondmilk and to drive trial and awareness of Silk Almondmilk among non-users, the Silk marketing team developed a program leveraging existing Silk fans as advocates on social media. This activation used Facebook's new messaging system and enabled Silk fans to give 5 friends a free coupon for a half gallon of Almondmilk. Our advocates were incentivized to "give 5" to their friends by being entered for a chance to win a $500 gift card. New users were offered a coupon for a free half gallon of Almondmilk.
This program was supported by an influencer program, a Twitter party, and social content driving to the promotion and reinforcing the campaign RTBs (reasons to believe) supporting the taste of Silk Almondmilk. Give 5 achieved nearly 60K entries, 300% more than anticipated, and secured 13K CRM sign ups. Overall, the Silk Give 5 Campaign exceeded goals by 130%.
This campaign was based around the idea of harnessing the power of our top Silk advocates to help achieve our marketing objective of driving trial of Silk amongst non-users. We challenged our Silk fans to pick 5 deserving friends who they thought should try Silk Almondmilk as a tasty and healthy alternative to milk, give them a free coupon, and be entered for a chance to win a $500 gift card for helping to spread the love of Silk.
In order to reach our most loyal consumers first and increase the likelihood that they would select friends who were not current Silk Almondmilk users, the rollout strategy was to start with a custom audience of the 14k most engaged Facebook fans and then extend out to broader audiences with time. This approach was intended to reward core fans with advance access while simultaneously building momentum for the campaign.
The process was simple: Our Silk consumers were invited to enter to win a $500 gift card by giving 5 friends a coupon to try Silk for free. The first loyal "advocates" to complete the program received a surprise kit in the mail. This experience was hosted on a landing page within Silk.com + utilized Facebook's updated messaging platform where our loyal Silk fans sent their friends a direct message, letting them know why they loved Silk, why they thought their friend should try it and a link for a free coupon. When any of their 5 selected friends signed up for the coupon, the fan advocate gained an additional entry into the sweepstakes to win the gift card.
When the friend (non-user) received the message, they were greeted by Phil (the plant character from our TV advertising campaigns), who asked them whether they'd like to give Silk a try. If the friend said no, Phil would ask them why and then respond in a quirky way, addressing some of the common barriers to entry (I don't know what it tastes like, I already enjoy milk, etc.). Then the friend would get another change to try Silk and claim their free coupon.
The program gathered valuable information from our loyal users (why they loved Silk) and new users (confirmation of barriers). It also helped activate our advocates on social and drive trial and awareness through credible sources.
The team projected, based on industry benchmarks and the size of the Silk social audience, that the program would secure 15K entries. By the end of the month-long execution, there were just shy of 60K entrants. Give 5 was the first execution of its kind that the Silk team had created and its enormous success has it in consideration for use in future campaigns.
This social program was supported across Silk's social and digital channels and included a Twitter party as well as a blogger program that tested a custom video, featuring Silk Almondmilk, created by one of our influencers. The Twitter Party achieved 107K impressions in one day and our influencer program exceeded all expected KPIs by over 100% and attained 407K impressions.
