• by Larissa Faw , September 2, 2015

In December 2013, the Holderness family found unexpected viral success with its "Xmas Jammies" video that has since acquired more than 16 million views and spawned a series of family-oriented clips. This visibility enabled the family to sign its first-ever agreement with publisher SheKnows Media to co-produce sponsored videos. 

Now, the family and SheKnows Media are launching a branded content video for Horizon Organic as part of the food brand's back-to-school promotion. Horizon Media serves as the media buying and planning shop. 

"This video is the marquee piece with additional elements that bring the brand to life," including editorial content and two other videos that collectively convey how Horizon Organic products make lunch easier for moms, says Susan Getgood, Director of Integrated Marketing, SheKnows. "There isn't just one isolated piece, but [all components] were authentically integrated so the total story works together." Additional creative under this promotion include a how-to article to turn an Organic Horizon cheese stick into a caterpillar and simple and easy lunch suggestions. 

The cornerstone of the effort is the Holderness family with their large fan base and social media platform. While the family is best known for its musical parodies, this video is its first non-parody video. 

"Penn and Kim Dean Holderness are great people, incredible parents and their two kids, Lola and Penn Charles, are genuinely entertaining," says Jennifer Hughes Associate Manager, Digital Marketing, Horizon Organic. "They are a real life family dealing with real life situations - such as providing their family with better for you lunches and snacks - that our Horizon Organic consumers can relate to, so it made a lot of sense for us to align." 

The video explores what happens when the children switch roles with their parents to get them ready for their day. For instance, the two kids dress their parents and pack them lunch. One cute moment is when the kids send them out the door, believing they have everything, only to learn that their parents are shoeless. 

Although Horizon Organic products are viewed throughout the clip, there are no overt references or mention of the brand. This subtle branding is important, says Getgood. "It's more about story-telling than [pushing a product]." Adds Horizon Organic's Hughes,"We wanted our integration to be very authentic so it was important to us that we did not attempt to overtly or un-naturally integrate the Horizon Organics brand into the creative messaging." 

The family was largely left alone in developing the video, creating the concept and product integration on their own. "We laid out the what we hoped to accomplish and they brought the great ideas," says Getgood. "The Holderness family already loved the brand so it was easy to tell the story to relate to the joy and pleasure of going back to school," says Getgood. 

The video can be seen here. It appears across the SheKnows platform which attracts nearly 80 million unique visitors per month and will be seeded through the Holderness' network as well. This campaign is specifically designed to reach women - in particular moms - ages 18-54 with school-aged children. 

"During the busy back to school time frame when many brands are marketing to parents, Horizon Organic needed to break through to inspire and support parents as they get ready for school and fuel their children’s curiosity and imagination," says Erin Driscoll, Senior Digital Strategist, Horizon Media. "We wanted to tap into the excitement and frenzy around the back to school season and recognize the pressure that parents experience in getting their kids ready for school. To seed this video we will leverage our unique partnership with SheKnows and their breadth of assets, as well as amplifying Horizon Organics’ owned assets to further deepen the connection with our community." 

In less than 24 hours, the video accumulated 82,000 views and total video views for the first seven days reached 502,575. As of August 31st, Horizon Organic on SheKnows Media is performing at 36% lift in brand awareness and 69.3% lift in purchase intent. 

Not all ad placement, however, is performing equally. The SheKnows custom placement has the best lift at 56.3% lift in awareness and 76.2% lift in purchase intent, while media placement of 300x250 images are attracting 33.7% lift in awareness and 43.9% lift in purchase intent.

While it is too soon to declare the campaign a success, SheKnows will measure its effectiveness through views, completions, and comparison to other similar programs. Horizon Organic, for its part, will determine success though lifts in awareness and purchase intent. 

Separately, Horizon Organic hopes to increase its awareness among moms through a marketing collaboration with the upcoming release of “The Peanuts Movie” in November. This partnership will include Peanuts branded packaging on varieties of Horizon Mac & Cheese, milk box and cookies and sandwich cracker products. Horizon is also sponsoring a sweepstakes to win Horizon snacks for a year and to attend the movie's premiere.