Game Day is big business for sports fans, yet weather, costs, bad seats and limited access to fantasy teams mean more fans are watching the game at home. That’s where KFC saw a big opportunity. To coincide with the launch of its new Gameday Bucket (8 pcs of chicken, 8 hot wings and 10 Bites), KFC coined a whole new word and created a social campaign/contest to support it: #Couchgating. #Couchgating is the act of bringing a traditional “tailgate" indoors complete with couch, friends and delicious KFC. To get people talking about and participating in #Couchgating, KFC encouraged fans to share tips, rules and photos of their Couchgating using the hashtag for a chance to win a Couchgating living room make over. We created an app on Facebook to house sharable sample tips, rules and legendary Couchgaters and also spotlight the finalists. The campaign was supported with a full 360 campaign, including paid social, PR, radio, and a TV commercial that featured people Couchgating.KFC helped inspire an occasion with #Couchgating and people around the world took to the fun. There were over 7,000 uses of the term #Couchgating on Twitter resulting in 18.77 million impressions. The Couchgating video we created specifically for social with the hashtag received more than 75,000 views (a 300 percent increase in views over other KFC videos). Through its Twitter handle, KFC (@KFC_Colonel) engaged with people using the hashtag and shared some of our favorites. Tweets drove to the KFC Facebook page, which received more than 110,000 new likes in one day – the highest of any Facebook page. In addition, we saw more than a 1000% increase in people talking about the brand. When there were reports about the possible Super Bowl wing shortage, we used it as an opportunity to reach out to influencers on social (Ryan Seacrest, Bro Bible, etc.) to bring KFC's GameDay Bucket and Couchgating into the conversation. Long after the promotion ended, people are still Couchgating with KFC and letting us know about it.
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