• by Femaris Pena , Columnist, May 30, 2017

As a sneak peek at the 2017 North American Effie Awards, MediaPost and Effie Worldwide have once again collaborated to showcase some of the winning cases that will be awarded gold, silver or bronze Effies at the gala on June 1. This series focuses on learning and best practices from the Media Effie categories. Effie Awards are known by advertisers and agencies globally as the pre-eminent award in the marketing industry and recognize any and all forms of communication that contribute to a brand's success.

2017 EFFIE Award Preview: #ComeSeekLive
Femaris Pena, VP, Group Media Director at Mediahub (division of the MullenLowe Group) 

Category: Media Effie: Media Innovation - Existing Channel

Client: Royal Caribbean International

Agency: MullenLowe Mediahub U.S. (with contributing agencies MullenLowe U.S. and Rapport)

Title: #ComeSeekLive

Challenge: In 2015, Royal Caribbean recognized that US growth rates had slowed relative to key international markets. This was primarily due to decreased growth among first time cruisers. 

Traditional cruise brands were spending heavily in local markets to attract repeat, high frequency, aging “cruisers”; thus, adding to the issue of low new-consumer entry into the cruise category. 

We, therefore, made the bold decision to quit fighting amongst the category for repeat guests and instead court a new and younger never-before-cruised audience. The benchmarks for success would become new to cruise sailings, which had not grown in six years.

A key barrier to attracting this new audience, however, were the widespread misconceptions about the cruise experience. Stereotypes and the perception that cruising is a one-size-fits-all vacation were all things we needed to combat. We needed to show them a whole new way to cruise that fit their need for discovery and exciting new experiences. 

Solution: In order to defy category perceptions, we needed to be authentic and demonstrative. So we created a first-of-its kind interactive execution that connected the breadth of outdoor in NYC with the Livestreaming nature of Periscope. 

We sent five adventurous social media influencers, relatable to our young prospects, on a Royal Caribbean vacation. For seven days, across five islands, onboard Royal Caribbean’s newest ship, Anthem of the Seas, our influencers Periscope’d 22 broadcasts. We beamed these live across 86 outdoor screens throughout New York City. 

We created technology that would harness the cellular strength needed to livestream from remote locations and created custom connections that would support and display live video across two ubiquitous outdoor networks in the city. 

We converted the traditional eight-second digital outdoor exposure-loop to the first-ever 15-minute live broadcasts of stereotype-shattering excursions, unfolding during the morning and evening commutes.

Tapping into our influencers’ social followings and promoting the live streams through Twitter, we expanded our reach and increased engagement outside of New York.

We enabled audiences to take part in the adventures and direct the influencers’ entire trip via real-time comments on Periscope. They could decide what our influencers would do at every step of the way: From where they went hiking in Puerto Rico to going head or feet first down a natural rock water slide, we intercepted and invited hard to convince and skeptical New Yorkers to #ComeSeek and demonstrated exactly what they could be doing RIGHT NOW on a Royal Caribbean cruise.

Results: In NY, Social sentiment for the brand increased 23% compared to the 2015 historical average, representing the largest and most sustained lift since measurement of this metric began in 2014. We also saw a 19% lift in consideration YOY during Q4 2015; establishing a 34% lead over the competition during the same time period.

Sailings among those who have never cruised before increased 19% in NYC during the quarter following this activation; which garnered 41M press impressions, 28K social followers, 22M social impressions, 7M OOH impressions, 15K #comeseeklive mentions and 30K Periscope views.