Social TransformationTM
Diageo
We created Diageo’s Social Transformation roadmap to help their Culture & Entertainment team bring social first principles to its portfolio of hero brands — Smirnoff, Tanqueray, Gordon’s, Captain Morgan, and Baileys — across its primary European markets.
Getting Started
To inform our roadmap, we delivered initial brand level social audit and strategy work, continuously tracking and optimizing it using a measurement and evaluation program we developed in conjunction with Diageo’s Culture & Entertainment team called ‘ICE: Intelligence for Culture & Entertainment.’
We designed ICE to bring credibility to earned media measurement across Diageo’s brands and feed consistent data to econometrics and ROI measurement.
With the strategic direction set, we then moved into implementation design, establishing the social tech stack, content engine, and publishing workflow to help brand teams develop and publish always-on social creative. This always-on voice is punctuated with conversational and creative campaigns, co-created with relevant influencers, and designed to be participatory.
We executed the campaign through a music video on Lady Leshurr’s social pages, ads on Spotify and Facebook, a responsible drinking site, and an exclusive gig. The campaign reached an estimated 17M across social media, press, and Spotify ads, generating 45k social likes, comments, and shares, as well as 50k visits to the campaign site. The campaign results also delivered a positive ROI measured through Diageo’s Econometric modeling.
We know people want us to talk about moderation in a way that feels relevant to them, so partnering with influencers like Lady Leshurr is a great way to create authentic conversations on responsible drinking. We have a global goal of reaching 200 million people around the world with messages on moderation from our brands by 2025, and this campaign is a powerful example of one of our biggest brands helping us to achieve this.
Carolyn Panzer, Global Alcohol in Society Director
Gordon’s Gin
When Gordon’s first began working with us in 2016, the brand was lagging in an increasingly vibrant gin category. To help the brand recover, grow, and take advantage of the ‘gin boom,’ we created Gordon’s first social strategy. The primary objective was to transform Gordon’s social content, establishing a culturally led, social-first, and best-in-class brand voice.
A fundamental component was the ‘Ginspired Moments Barometer’ — a criterion and methodology we created to qualify the most compelling niche cultural moments to insert the brand into.
We also focused on ‘Social Look & Feel’ to define how Gordon’s existed on social, embracing native social formats, production techniques, and visual trends.
Armed with the ‘Ginspired Moments Barometer’ and the re-defined ‘Social Look & Feel,’ we’ve since produced hundreds of conversational creative pieces, helping the brand move to the top of the gin category. In 2019, this category grew by $1.4bn, and Gordon’s accounted for 30% of that growth — more than any other brand. It’s now recognized as the world’s top and most valuable gin brand.
This continually evolving social strategy has now been deployed in 25 markets across Europe, LATAM, Australia, and Africa, and continues to deliver fantastic results.
Our global social approach and execution have also paid dividends in earned brand conversation. In 2019, Gordon’s global conversation was declining YoY (-54%) despite a growing gin category (+35%). Since our strategy implementation, earned mentions for Gordon’s globally are now growing faster than the category (198% v 98%).
Impact
The ICE program has won x3 AMEC Awards – the leading awards for the media measurement industry.
GOLD – Best Use of a Measurement Framework
GOLD – ‘Step Change Award’ for the best improvement of a measurement journey
PLATINUM – Grand Prix for the most effective PR consultancy, communication agency and in-house communications team campaign.
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