17 Jul 5 Out-of-the-Box Digital Marketing Examples from 2018
We are barely halfway through 2018 and already there have been several digital marketing examples that have raised the bar high. By tapping into trends and sharing engaging stories through multiple platforms, these out-of-the-box marketing campaigns used a variety of themes and styles to help organizations generate a lot of buzz around their message, product, and brand.
With 61 percent of marketers citing their top inbound marketing priority is to improve SEO (search engine optimization) and grow their organic presence according to HubSpot’s 2017 State of Inbound report, the digital marketing campaigns need to drive engagement by evoking emotions and capturing the imagination of the target audience. Why? Because impactful campaigns sway customers when they are making purchase decisions.
To help you out, here we have aligned five out-of-the-box digital marketing examples from 2018 (thus far), so you cans see what strategies they have used to influence the users.
1. ABTA Jumps on the ‘#footselfie’ Bandwagon to Lure Holidaymakers
Image Credit: ContentWorks
Last year, ABTA, a renowned association of travel agents and tour operations in the United Kingdom, launched a campaign on Boxing Day to highlight why vacationers should book with an ABTA member throughout January.
The campaign was named ‘Travel with Confidence’. The digital marketing agency handling the campaign tapped into the social media trend of taking ‘footselfies’ to show the wide array of destinations from ABTA brands. Besides this, they also promoted the hashtag #beABTAsmart and arranged a competition for social media users which gave them the opportunity to win several prizes.
2.Intuit Creates an Animated Movie to Get its Idea Across
Image Credit: Intuit
Intuit — that develops and sells tax preparation, accounting, and financial software to individuals and small businesses — launched a new brand campaign this year. The first part of the campaign comprises a short animated story of two business owners that was showcased at the 2018 Super Bowl.
The idea was to bring all of Intuit’s brands together, including Quickbooks, Mint, and TurboTax. Since millions of people were using Intuit’s products, but only four out of every thousand users were leveraging two or more of them. So the brand took the leap of faith and attempted to show the audience that its products are best when used together.
To represent the power of its products, the company’s digital marketing agency created a character of a giant robot in the animated movie. The agency believed animation was the best way to get Intuit’s idea across. The 15-second teaser was run during the Super Bowl LII, driving users back to the full film online.
In addition, the social media campaign of the brand featured a Snapchat filter showcasing the Intuit Giant. The robot was used as a symbol in the campaign showcasing how the brand’s services harness technology to make financial processes easy-peasy for its users. The animated movie revolves around Pete, a flower shop owner, who fails to find time to enjoy his outside passions owing to his frantic schedule and Pari, an engineer and entrepreneur, who is keen to help him by creating the Intuit Giant.
Shedding light on the target audience for the marketing campaign, the chief marketing officer, Lucas Watson divulged there are 750 million people around the globe that work for themselves and manage their finances while chasing their passions. Unfortunately, the pressure of managing time and money sometimes makes them feel as if the odds are stacked against them.
The campaign has worked wonders for the brand so it will continue to use it throughout the year. In fact, Intuit will work on additional channels and executions to promote its cohort of services.
3. Dollar Shave Club Marks its Arrival in the UK with a Creative Campaign
Image Credit: CityAm
Founded in 2011, Dollar Shave Club was acquired by Unilever in 2016. Lately, the razor subscription brand decided to step into the UK market and to mark its arrival the company used a creative social and experiential campaign.
Not only the Dollar Shave Club launched a pop-up in Old Street station earlier in January to offer passers-by free shaves, live comedy, and foosball tournaments but also partnered with several social influencers to create hype and relevant content around the launch. This partnership worked for the firm as it made the heads turn.
Sure, we are yet to see if the Dollar Shave Club’s products make a strong impact in the UK market. But, if you compare the hotly anticipated marketing campaign of the brand with the classic US version, you’ll come to know that Dollar Shave Club is surely off to a good start.
4. ESSC Launches a Thought-Provoking Campaign to Encourage Social Change
Image Credit: ESSC
Easterseals Southern California (ESSC) is an organization that assists over 10,000 people with disabilities in different parts of California. The organization has recently launched a new thought-provoking ad campaign that stars its own program recipients. The title of the campaign was “Changing the Way to See Disability,” and its aim was to encourage social change and create inclusion. And to make it work the marketers came up with a really catchy slogan: ‘Celebrate. Don’t Separate.’
Image Credit: #CelebrateDontSeparate
According to Mark Whitley, the President, and CEO of ESSC, when people unite as one, they can break down barriers and create social change. He said that each day people make sweeping statements about people with disabilities and a lot of them don’t even realize what they are doing. So to aid people to look beyond what they see at first glance ESSC has launched this movement so we can have a more inclusive world.
The campaign was rolled out through many different channels, including internet, print, and outdoor ads along with “Make the Promise” social media campaign. The idea behind launching the social media campaign was to ask general people to promote the message of inclusion and use the hashtag #CelebrateDontSeparate.
To create a profound impact, six California residents were used in the first phase of the campaign along with two ESSC recipients who met through the program and are now engaged. The new campaign has greatly helped ESSC in bringing the social change.
5. LinkedIn Steps Up to Crush its ‘White Collar’ Typecast with New Campaign
Image Credit: YouTube
The popular business social network LinkedIn is looking to squash it’s ‘white collar’ typecast and to realize its dream the brand has released a TV spot titled “In it Together” back in January during the 2018 Golden Globe Awards show.
This was something LinkedIn has never done in the past. However, it certainly makes sense since the brand is looking to disentangle itself from its current perception. The influential thing about the “In it Together” campaign was the diverse range of businesses and people that featured in it.
The new campaign was the first real integrated marketing effort by the social network. Apart from the TV spot, the marketing campaign also included a digital display, online video, search engine marketing, paid social media & outdoor ads, partnerships, podcasts, and radio spots. All in all, the campaign lasted for 12 weeks and it targeted four core markets: Los Angeles, San Francisco, Atlanta, and Philadelphia.
The idea was to compare LinkedIn activity in these cities with other parts of the world that haven’t been targeted to comprehend the results of the campaign. The black-and-white, documentary-style video showcased the success stories of LinkedIn users in their own unique environments.
While explaining the impact of the campaign Stacy Peralta, the campaign director, revealed in an email to Adweek that she knew from the beginning that this is one of those rare opportunities. Because LinkedIn wanted her to share real stories about real people and they wanted the candor, energy, and enthusiasm of the people involved.
So her team found and documented unique people who are using the platform. They filmed new musicians, real-life cowboys, chefs, MMA fighters, animators, and physics teachers. All of them were not only using LinkedIn but are keen to share its effect on their careers.
Final Thoughts
Of course, the tried-and-tested elements of advertising remain the same, but the unique thing about all the aforementioned marketing campaigns is the use of elements that produced emotions, encouraged empathy and most of all humanizes the brand. This tells digital marketing service providers to explore various avenues in order to find the best fit for their clients so they can achieve desired results.