Our client, National Pork Board (NPB), leads as a catalyst and connector to add value and build trust among those who produce, process, sell, and consume pork worldwide. Pork’s opportunities to make it to the plate are at risk. Fresh pork has continually been a third-place protein behind beef and chicken. Per NPB’s Meat Tracker Study, pork has also consistently had negative net protein momentum, a metric calculated by the difference between those who reported they plan to eat more and those who plan to eat less of a given protein. To make matters worse, Hispanics have regularly been early adopters and experimenters of most diet trends of which pork isn’t an inherent ingredient.
Our goal with NPB’s Hispanic Platform Ponle Pork was to increase fresh pork sales among Hispanics and, to do so, we needed to make it relevant and approachable to Millennials and Gen Z Hispanics by giving consumers permission and convenient ways to eat fresh pork.
- As the main protein in many traditional and holiday dishes, pork is already culturally relevant for Hispanics. Thanks to NPB’s qualitative research, we also learned that Hispanic consumers see pork as a heavy and hard-to-cook protein. This leaves pork needing a new role to increase consumption occasions and frequency. Our strategic approach was to shift pork from being a centerpiece during the holidays to a versatile and exciting everyday ingredient. The answer? We developed Ponle Pork as the USH strategic platform in 2022, which roughly translates to “put on/in the pork.” Ponle Pork gives our Hispanic audience permission to consume pork by positioning it as that go-to protein that adds to our meals, traditions, routines, and healthy lifestyles.
- In 2023, we continued to build, strengthen, and reinforce this strategy. Our goal was to continue to make pork matter by raising awareness around pork as a protein that’s nutritious and versatile, engaging key stakeholders to focus on overcoming barriers and giving consumers permission to eat pork.
- We understood the cultural tensions and consumer challenges within our audience, and that fueled our efforts to continue to position pork as a nutritious and flavorful alternative to other proteins. At the core of our strategy, we honed in on the understanding that pork is integral to Hispanic culture and that consumers are driven by the desire to savor their favorite traditional pork meals and share these special moments with friends and family.
- After identifying our two key audiences (Bicultural Millennial and Gen Z Hispanics), we built an ecosystem that brought the Ponle Pork message to life through various channels to meet our consumers wherever they were in their journey.
- Central to our strategy was an intensified presence on our owned Instagram profile and the official launch of our owned TikTok channel, strategically leveraging recipe content that highlighted pork as a versatile ingredient. This approach allowed us to further engage with our existing audience while at the same time reaching a broader audience.
- Our content strategy honed in on dynamic short-form video formats that highlighted pork’s versatility and relevance in the Hispanic community through traditional (and sometimes unexpected) Hispanic recipes. Our messaging, at the core, was focused on emphasizing that “adding pork” to your meal not only helps connect you to your roots but also makes your meals more flavorful and more nutritious.
- We maximized Ponle Pork’s exposure through year-long influencer partnerships amplified across TikTok and Instagram, working with a strategic mix of creators that helped us connect and reach our younger consumers while engaging and retaining our existing audience.
Ponle Pork has resulted in over 116M total impressions and 13M total engagements across platforms, and our community has grown by over 14K new followers across platforms in 2023. Our mix of owned and creator videos received over 37M views.
The launch of our TikTok profile in May 2023 proved successful, and in just 7 months it drove over 92K total engagements. On Instagram, our creators alone garnered 396K total engagements. Overall, our creator program has proven to be a success, which can be shown in the 541K total engagements that were gathered across platforms.
- Overall Video Results 2023: 37M views across TikTok and Instagram
- TikTok Results 2023: 92K total engagements
- Instagram Creator Results 2023: 396K total engagements
- Overall Creator Content Results 2023: 541K total engagements across platforms
- Overall Community Growth 2023: 14,158 followers
