The Objective:
Last March people’s lives changed overnight with the outbreak of Covid-19. With parents and carers suddenly becoming full-time teachers, whilst juggling work and home life, BBC Studios looked to see how we could help by providing some light relief and moments of joy.
Hey Duggee is a cult children’s TV show that explores learning through play and also taps into relatable parenting moments. Our objective was to offer brand-new and original content to help inspire, entertain and excite our audiences during a time of real uncertainty. We also wanted to harness our content to be a helpful resource for parents and children.
The Goals:
Using social listening, we spotted that parents and children were feeling cooped-up at home and isolated from their friends. We predicted that soon, many parents would be looking for support to help keep their children entertained and motivated, and we wanted to be ready.
In addition to this, as every parent and carer knows, it’s really hard to encourage children to wash their hands properly. BBC Studios looked to see how we could help, and add a splash of fun.
Lastly, we wanted to provide a space for parents on our social channels, and let them know that Duggee is here for them, as much as he is for the kids.
The Strategy:
We ensured that we tailored our content to meet these new family needs and created original, relatable content that would surprise and delight our two main audiences: parents and children.
For children, we created a brand-new handwashing song, as well as exciting, fun assets for them to do at home. From makes, bakes and everything in between we provided a variety of activities around different themes that would help to keep them entertained at home. Knowing they were stuck at home, we also commissioned a series of original Hey Duggee songs to create some energy-burning activities!
For the grown-ups, we harnessed the opportunity to bring together online communities at a time when parents were at their wits end and needed that extra bit of moral support. We therefore ensured that we tapped into relatable parenting moments, whilst also giving them activites to occupy their kids for a few minutes.
The Implementation:
We dramatically increased our content output and post frequency, introduced innovative virtual live events, and harnessed cultural moments to create motivational and relatable content for our community. Utilizing new features such as the Facebook Premiere Live, we generated buzz by teasing our new Hey Duggee songs to our fans and encouraging them to tune-in live for a virtual Hey Duggee disco.
Working collaboratively with Studio AKA and freelance editors we used a mix of original and new animation to create a handwashing song in rapid time. The song needed to meet W.H.O guidelines on handwashing time, whilst being memorable and fun for fans and their kids. We chose the iconic Stick Song, which has amassed 6.5million views on YouTube. The song was then reimagined as “Washy Washy, Wash Wash”.
Inspired by the active parenting community on Facebook, we created a "Parenting Badge in 2020", an original video compilation voiced by Hey Duggee narrator Alexander Armstrong and a special one-off parenting badge Facebook frame. This was premiered on the Hey Duggee Facebook platform to celebrate and honour the Duggee parenting community during the global pandemic. Fans showed their appreciation for this heartwarming piece of content, which tapped into the current situation with Duggee's unique and upbeat spin on life.
Using key editorial themes from the show such as transportation, space and sports, we created an array of entertaining content that encouraged learning through play that could be enjoyed remotely through the YouTube Kids app.
From makes and bakes, fun facts, quizzes, our Friday Riddle Club and original movie artwork posters through to helping children earn their 'hand washing badge' we offered families some moments of joy. We sought to leverage our strong social community to unite families and share the Duggee love at a time when we all needed it.
We saw an overwhelmingly positive response across all of our social platforms, delivering significantly higher results than our channel averages. This demonstrates that children and parenting communities were particularly engaged with our wealth of stay-at-home content, and keen to find solace in the world of Hey Duggee at a time when they faced extreme challenges and uncertainty. Please see below the key results for the hero pieces of content that we’re most excited to share.
Facebook results (unless otherwise stated) vs our benchmark for the entire year (2020) performance.
The Parenting Badge
· 1.2 million views (+5,711% higher views)
Spooky Song
· 3.2M+ views across all platforms
· +481% higher interactions
· +180% higher reactions
· +118% more comments
· + 444% more shares
Wheels on the Bus
· + 47% higher views on YouTube
· +48% higher reach
· + 360% higher interactions
· +80% higher reactions
· + 76% more comments
· +182% more shares
Twelve Days of Christmas
· +552K views across all platforms
· + 147% higher reach
· + 626% more interactions
· +294% more reactions
· + 129% more comments
· + 595% more shares
Jingle Bells
· +2,872% more views on Facebook
· 2x higher views on YouTube
· +5,805% higher reach
· +623% higher reactions
· +669% more comments
· +2,356% more shares
Handwashing Badge
· 178k views (+3,444% increase)
· + 840% more interactions
· +324% higher reactions
· +11% more comments
· +1,182% more shares
Science with Duggee
· 14M views (12.9M more than average)
· 1.1M hours Watch Time
