Outlander has always been a revolutionary, genre-breaking series, made only more epic by the passionate fanbase that rallies around it 7 days a week, 365 days a year. The first half of Season 7 saw a return to many of the key themes that made fans fall in love with the series in the first place: time travel, high stakes, action, and of course romance. It was STARZ’s objective to deliver a social campaign that kept fans buzzing and let the wider TV community know that there’s no better time to get into Outlander.
Outlander has a little something for everyone, and we took that approach to heart as we promoted the series across Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, YouTube, and more.
As the campaign kicked off, we knew we could count on our binge-watching, stan-account-running, diehard Outlander fans to be our word of mouth ambassadors. We kept them fed with a steady drumbeat of content strategically built to keep the show in the zeitgeist, from exclusive behind-the-scenes sneak peeks during production, to a global World Outlander Day virtual toast, to tentpole content releases on holidays like Christmas as our “gift to the fans.”
With this season’s return to classic and compelling Outlander themes and the massive growth of TikTok and Reels since our previous season, we saw a huge opportunity to bring in new audiences. Across platforms, we leaned in by seeding weekly content that was broadly appealing - focusing on the romance (Jamie and Claire are #couplegoals), stunning cinematography of the show, relatable family dynamics, and of course, memes.
Finally, we leaned heavily into the knowledge that fans don’t just build investment in a series, but also in the people who make it all happen. We put our cast front and center, giving fans coveted access through Q&As and Instagram Lives, content from set, event coverage including a red carpet live stream, and “Inside Outlander” mega threads featuring production facts, sketches, and more, all with the aim of delighting current fans and attracting new ones via our cast’s winning charisma.
Our strategy of keeping a steady drumbeat of diverse assets and engaging the passionate community paid off to the tune of a 52% increase in social engagements season over season – no small feat for a seventh season! Our premiere was the #1 most socially-engaged primetime episode across cable networks, and we saw #OutlanderAtMidnight trend in Twitter/X’s top 10 several times, showing that not only do fans talk about our show, but they show up as soon as it drops!
Our social-first, fan-focused approach meant that our content truly flourished. Assets like our cast doing their best “Sassenach” impression, cinematic “living” key art, Sam Heughan’s set tour, and compelling clips broke records for the series, becoming our best performing posts of all time for reach and engagement. Our content succeeded not only on Outlander handles but STARZ too – Season 7 content occupies 9/10 of the top performing STARZ YouTube Shorts of all time!
