#DesafioDoPintinho was an Instagram challenge, designed to go viral and to promote the comeback of one of the top Brazilian TV hosts, Gugu. It ran on February 2015, one week prior to the first airing, and consisted of Gugu himself dancing and singing his famous song, about a yellow little chick, on Instagram. He challenged three other people to do the same, in a kind of strategic cobweb that was create to amplify its reach.
Gugu, back in the day, used to sing a song about a yellow little chick - and danced to it, while everyone mirrored, when he had a Sunday afternoon show. Now he was back at Rede Record, after a short hiatus, but at night. Like his young days, when he hosted late shows.
To promote that return, to raise awareness of the comeback (and even of this new identity, funnier and self-conscious of its "vintage hype"), we designed that 'challenge' - that worked somehow as the Ice Bucket Challenge, and
means something like #LittleChickChallenge, in Portuguese. It should be viral and not involve any budget whatsoever. We would not have "winners" at the end, but the contest would result in some of the coolest videos by random people being shown on TV among the celebrities who did it as well.
First we came up with the idea of using Gugu's traditional Pintinho Amarelinho song, because it was iconic, to somehow push up his comeback. We definitely should use biggest coolest old stuff of his past to make it happen. All right. With no budget involved, we need to make the thing go viral a week prior to the first airing. And manage to make people join it willingly, because it obviously can't end up being a failure.
There was one way out: we got a sheet of paper and started drawing a chain reaction. Gugu always danced with a lot of kids and people mirroring along, somehow like an old Britney Spears music video (which was contemporaneous, by the way). That would have to be transposed to the social media environment.
Challenging three people would be the traditional way to go, having the ice bucket challenge in mind. But, if he went with three random people, the chain could break and die at any moment - if they refuse to do it gradually, because, of course, no one was paid to do it (no budget!) or forced.
So we designed a cobweb. Our chain. Two of the three challenged people would be TV show hosts of our own network, so we could ask them to help and keep the chain going. And the third one would be anyone they want. Friends, coworkers, family, fellow celebrities, whatever. That way, we kept the challenge's "flux" going on, at the same time that people got invited in. Singers, actors, regular people.
We kept this strategy for the first five layers of the pyramid - which means Gugu, at the top, challenged two of our show hosts and a third person. For those two show hosts, we asked them to challenge two more show hosts and a random third part. Going like this until the fifth layer. From that point on, we knew that the initial push would be enough and that the project would spread on its own. And it worked. Out of the blue, videos with celebrities started popping up on our feeds, along with videos from all over the country.
It was, indeed, a Brazil-only strategy and we knew that - since Gugu is widely famous here, one of the most famous TV host of all time in Brazil. Only here. We projected that, if all of this was done with a worldwide known show host, like an American one, with American celebrities (that are known all around the globe), most certainly this would have been a world-class challenge - and maybe, who knows, it inspires fellow social media strategists to do something like this!
#DesafioDoPintinho was designed to, without cost, active some of the biggest personal Instagram accounts in Brazil. The result was fabulous: Neymar Jr., one of the world's top 15 Instagram users and by far the leading Brazilian account (now with almost 35 million followers), did it.
And so did his fellow football player, David Luiz, that holds the 3rd biggest Brazilian account. Something a brand would have to pay millions of dollars to have - and we had it free, just by dancing and singing! Someone arbitrarily invited them to join, and they jumped in. With them, a bunch of other celebrities that holds, each one, millions of followers.
Our strategy of workflow with two-thirds consisting of our own "system" turned out to be a solid choice, giving strength to the project, and, in the end, it paid out. It made possible for regular people and other celebrities to join and, at the same time, kept the flux active, nonstopable.
For that third element at each challenge, we had both celebrities outside of our network, such as singers, actors, TV hosts, and regular people, of course. Joining and playing along.
People could post their videos wherever they wanted, but Instagram, being huge in Brazil, was the main platform for the campaign. Resulting in millions and millions of impacts. We had spontaneous media and coverage even from our competitors.
