The overall objective of the Western Union Facebook BOT campaign was to drive awareness and usage of the bot within the Facebook Messenger platform. Thus providing a money transfer solution that was integrated into our consumer's everyday life.
The activation within this platform was utilized to help drive brand reappraisal and position Western Union as a modern and innovative brand to the younger audience.
We developed unique creative assets and a diverse integrated marketing approach to truly amplify and highlight this new Western Union product feature to our current audience as well as a new customer set.
We knew that by creating awareness of the Western Union Facebook BOT we would be able to shift consumer's overall perception of the brand. So, we took a multi-platform approach to drive awareness as well as educate consumers on the BOT functionality.
We utilized a variety of marketing platforms to get our communication across:
Digital: Integrated digital execution through HTML banners, videos, search and partnership amplification through larger direct buys
Facebook: Facebook Live event, targeted dark posts, social care, carousel and video ads, F8 Presence, as well as marketing on our own social channels
PR/CRM: Traditional media augmentation through Press Releases, Social amplification through earned and owned channels, CRM outreach to active and lapsed customer sets within Western Union
By splitting the campaign into two categories (Launch & Convert), we built a creative concept that took a user down a specific journey of learning about the BOT and where to find it, and then converting the user from other traditional money transfer platforms over to the Facebook BOT. This new money transfer platform gives the customer an easy and convenient way to transfer money on their own terms and in their own time.
The Facebook BOT campaign resulted in a reach of over 280 million, with high video completion rates in the 92%, exceeding benchmarks across all partners. We had a 560% increase in total users over an 8 month period, and a 2800% increase in revenue in the Facebook BOT since launch.
In addition, we were one of the first brands to launch a Facebook partnership within the BOT platform, and were able to garner learnings to drive individuals into the Facebook Messenger platform, allowing for an increase in adoption and consideration of the platform, and how we are modernizing the Western Union brand through this product extension.
