The objective of the campaign was to reintroduce the Bugles brand to Gen-Z, a generation that did not share the millennial sentiment and appreciation for Bugles products. With a new face and packaging, we looked to TikTok as our primary platform for increasing brand awareness, driving sales and growing market share, all while generating brand-love and loyalty across the board with meme-led content that spoke to the everyday experiences of our younger, more socially savvy audience.
We needed to gain the trust of a new, younger generation of communiholics; who were born swiping and savvier on social media than any generation we’d seen before. This meant re-defining Bugles’ role on social.
Using various R&I sources, including: GWI, Arab Youth Survey & We Are Social x Hootsuite’s Global Digital Report, we studied Saudi Gen Z social and digital behaviour - crafting an audience-first strategic approach. In other words, we had to make our social approach more about them - and less about Bugles. We identified our opportunity, to breathe life into the brand on a platform that 47% of our consumers were using, as a means of fun and escapism during a very uncertain year; Tik Tok, or more specifically, memes on TikTok.
Our core creative concept was to reintroduce Bugles to the world by genuinely resonating with our curious new audience. We know that Gen-Z are allergic to advertising, and for that reason we decided to offer them the kind of content they actually want to see; content that was native to the platform, spoke to their experiences, gave them a laugh when they needed it most, all while stirring up a sense of nostalgia with every second they spent engaged.
We created a catchy musical score and paired it with a vertical, TikTok-ready film designed with our audience’s online behavior in mind; riddled with dank memes, high-energy dancing & familiar references, resulting in the least ad-like ad on the platform. We intentionally avoided saying the brand's name and simply allowed clever product-usage to speak for itself, bringing Bugles into the minds, hearts & news feeds of our Gen-Z audience.
In less than 4 weeks, the campaign hit over 1.2 BILLION views on TikTok in Saudi Arabia alone, with more than 168,000 videos created using our hashtag as well as 1,300 uses of our unique jingle.
With regards to our TikTok top view ads, our 15 second video achieved an average watch time per person of 16.33 seconds, which is 24% higher than the market benchmark (13.1s), also meaning that consumers watched it more than once.
The campaign received 1.2 million views on YouTube and 64% of our audience who viewed the video on Facebook & Instagram completed the video (2.9 million people) - exceeding the channel completion rate benchmark by 93%.
Overall we saw an Ad recall lift of 23%, brand awareness lift of 34% and we were featured in Campaign Middle East’s Top 10 Digital & Social campaigns of the year.
Resulting in Bugles sales increasing by 30% - achieving the highest ever market share for the brand.
