As a brand that sells ice cream, Paddle Pop faces challenges in reaching our audience due to general guidelines and kids' behavior. To reach our extremely social 8-year-olds that aren't allowed on social networks, we created our own social platform in the form of a game featuring the brand's iconic characters to engage with kids.
To engage and communicate with kids, we created our own social platform in the form of a game featuring the brand's iconic characters (Max and friends). It reinforces the associations that kids have between the characters and the ice cream.
World of Paddle Pop is the first branded Massively Multiplayer Online Game where kids create avatars, explore worlds, fight monsters, and meet other kids.
It features a safe chat that protects them from predators and allows them to communicate with kids around the world, regardless of language.
We developed World of Paddle Pop entirely in Singapore, in partnership with Magma Studios who provided the technology and expertise in massively multiplayer gaming.
To accurately recreate the brand's signature worlds and storyline, thousands of 3D assets were painstakingly built, digitally handpainted, and put together. We spearheaded the creative direction with the Unilever Global Brand Team, resulting in over 10 hours of interactive quests and scripts integrated into an always-on brand experience.
Working with 21 Unilever markets, all the content was then localized and deployed across server clusters in the Americas, Europe, and Asia Pacific.
In our beta launch, over 103,000 kids signed up to play. Since then, they have spent an average of 29 mins on the platform a day, beating industry benchmarks for social games by over 700%.
It marks the highest level of engagement the brand has ever achieved in digital.
Paddle Pop ice cream overall sales grew 7.4% across all markets. In top markets, sales grew by as much as 21%.
