Objectives

To stand out during holiday season, WestJet brought a memorable and heartwarming experience to both guests and employees alike. Objectives included:

• Reignite WestJet's equity during the Christmas season
• Involve every WestJetter across our network
• Own national media for a day
• Create, capture and share footage in real-time
• Release a video highlighting the day
• Create an activation whereby guests could truly witness, and interact with, WestJet's fun and caring culture both online and offline, giving them a joyful and sharable holiday experience they would share with friends and family.
• Enrich the lives of everyone in WestJet's world.

Strategy and Execution

For the past 3 years WestJet has been a leader in content marketing especially during the holiday season. To build on this equity WestJet created their 2015 holiday campaign – WestJet's 12,000 mini miracles. In a world where releasing video content during the holidays has become a cluttered space, WestJet took a new approach to content marketing in hopes of creating a movement, as opposed to a moment. The goal of the campaign was to encourage 12,000 WestJetters across the network to perform and submit (via social channels) 12,000 mini miracles (or random acts of kindness) on December 9^th over a 24 hour time period. Starting in London, UK across to Hawaii, US each mini-miracle submitted with #WestJetChristmas was tracked in real time by an internal team of WestJet volunteers at a Command Centre located in Calgary using the social tracking system Hashtagio. The campaign began with the idea of involving WestJet's entire network, 101 bases in total, but evolved into a movement globally.

An in-depth, experiential strategy was developed and executed, including:

• • Employee Engagement: An extensive internal communications plan and call to action to encourage employee participation. 12,000 WestJet employees across the network were given Blue Santa hats and instructions on how to perform miracles. Teams were supported with a budget to activate miracles within airports and local communities.
  • Street Teams: WestJet street teams were in place across 13 markets in WestJet's network to contribute to the miracle count. Street teams were followed by camera crews who captured key miracle footage throughout the day on December 9th in these key markets.
  • Social Media: Promoted posts on Facebook, Twitter, Periscope and WestJet blog/website to help drive amplified reach.
  • National & Regional Press Releases: Press releases were distributed nationally and regionally to help local media cover what was taking place in their market and included a local spokesperson that could speak to WestJet's efforts.
  • Media Tour: WestJet offered media a behind the scenes look by inviting a strategic group of reporters and key influencers to join Blue Santa on a chartered plane across Canada. Throughout the tour, Blue Santa performed key mini miracles and provided live interviews via phone and skype to regional and local media.
  • Radio Media Tour: Listened to top radio station morning shows in advance to determine what was on the hosts' Christmas wish lists and surprised the radio hosts with hand-delivered personalized gifts, driving awareness and buzz of the day.
  • Partner Collaboration: Engaged high profile partners such as Calgary Stampede and Toronto Blue Jays to participate and create their own consumable content using #WestJetChristmas.
  • Video Release: On December 16th 2015, the WestJet Christmas Miracle: 12,000 Mini Miracles video was unveiled on WestJet's YouTube page and amplified through a strategic communications plan
    • Transformed a timeless Christmas classic into a custom written and produced song. The lyrics, cadence and crescendo were all in sync to evoke emotion throughout the video.
    • URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ME9PmSZedB4

Results

The success of the concept was the first of its kind (for WestJet) to rely on user generated content being submitted in 24 hrs.

• 31,793 mini miracles submitted and counting
• Earned media from 2359 outlets
• Total earned media audience - 1,825,452,158
• $2,260,930 in earned media value
• 126.5M Twitter impressions
• 10.15M Facebook impressions (8.7M paid / 1.4M organic)
• 5.5M video views ( Facebook = 3,995,521 / YouTube = 1,472,312)
• 220,000 engagements on Facebook (likes, shares, comments)
• 21,504 total shares (Facebook & YouTube)
• 96% positive sentiment online
• 700,000+ page views of Christmas content on WestJet blog
• Exposure in 214 countries (YouTube) / 155 countries (Google Analytics - blog)
• Blog hub page contributed to a total of $898,000 in revenue
• A total of 3,456 Instagram photos were uploaded with the #WestJetChristmas hashtag
• 10 minute exclusive coverage on CBC's The National

Media