The Westminster Kennel Club is America's oldest organization dedicated to the sport of purebred dogs. Westminster Week, held annually in New York City, thousands of dogs across hundreds of breeds compete for the title 'Best in Show', with tens of thousands of attendees.
This year’s core objectives were to excite and engage all dog-loving social audiences leading up to and throughout the event.
To meet these objectives, we launched a multi-platform social campaign that tapped into social trends and served audiences the content they desired.
Fan-First Social Coverage
Throughout Westminster Week, our social media coverage gave social audiences a first-hand look at all the happenings at the event from an on-the-ground perspective. We developed hundreds of pieces of real-time social creative content on-site from the event and engaged with fans directly asking them what they wanted to see. Our content featured both popular and unique dog breeds, of which social audiences gravitate towards, to educate them on the dog show and responsible pet ownership.
Throughout Westminster Week, we launched a number of social contests to engage with audiences at home and those attending the event: #BestAtHomeContest, #ImAtWestminster, and #WKCJuniorsContest. Those who participated in the contests were featured on the jumbotron at Madison Square Garden and on-air during the Fox broadcast.
Our community management team worked around-the-clock leading up to and throughout the dog show to answer all fan and attendee inquiries including information on the dog breeds, show results, tune-in information and on-site questions.
TikTok Launch
For the first time this year, we launched Westminster on TikTok to reach new young audiences and introduce them to the sport. Our content tapped into trends of Gen Z and found unexpected ways to insert the brand into the cultural zeitgeist.
In just one week, the Westminster TikTok account gained over 10K followers and 825K video views. Our videos reached masses via the For You Page and trended on the discover page for over a week.
Pet-Focused Influencers
Inviting TikTok influencers with strong, pet-focused content to this year’s event was a key part of our TikTok launch strategy. The influencers created and shared content from their TikTok accounts allowing their audiences to learn more about Westminter. The influencers also shared tips and tricks making our TikTok strategy more effective.
Through strategic social efforts, GLOW and Westminster reached a new younger social audience while maintaining and engaging the core dog fancy community.
Westminster social audience grew by 19.5K followers throughout Westminster Week.
Westminster's social content throughout the event received over 13MM total impressions, 5.5M total video views, and 713K total engagements.
In one week, Westminster’s TikTok received 2.7M video views, 473.6K total likes, and 35.1K total followers.
The #BestAtHomeContest received over 31.1K mentions on Twitter and Instagram, a 230% increase over last year.
Throughout Westminster Week, Westminster trended on Twitter in the U.S. in the #4 spot (#WestminsterWeek2020) and #6 spot (#BestAtHomeContest).
