• by Les Luchter , November 13, 2024

Zola, the 11-year-old wedding planning and gift registry platform, is launching its first physical branded product on Wednesday: Imagine the Day, a card game described as a “modern twist on premarital counseling.”

According to Zola customer surveys, “almost a quarter of couples have gone through some sort of couple therapy or premarital counseling,” Allison Cullman, vice president of brand marketing and strategy, tells Marketing Daily. “We wanted to provide a tool for couples to think about the days they will encounter during wedding planning and throughout their marriage, and give them a really, approachable, playful, non-taboo way to do that.”

The game allows couples to confront such issues as “your values, your traditions, how you perceive and spend money, division of labor and family dynamics,” Cullman notes.

Imagine the Day can be added by brides and couples to their gift registries and is also on sale to anyone as a stand-alone item for $29.99, just in time for the holiday season.

“I will definitely be buying it for a few friends and family members.,” Cullman notes.

Helping to convince others along the same lines, Zola by early December will launch a paid ad campaign in which it will “be tapping a variety of different creators to help show the versatility and playfulness of the game in different situations,” Cullman says

“The campaign is centered around this idea of ‘imagine the day’ and really intended to get you to think toward your future with your partner,” she explains. “So that could be your wedding day that we know people are planning ahead for -- 89% of couples are taking tangible steps towards wedding planning beyond actually being engaged.”

The campaign, created in-house, will focus on Meta, TikTok and Reddit, “where we know a lot of these conversations are happening anonymously.”

Zola’s landing page for Imagine the Day  describes it as “a card game for curious couples” and including purchase links, sample cards, a short “how to play” guide, and info about the game’s designer Naomi Otsu.

“We’re targeting all engaged couples,” Cullman notes, by looking at “interest-based targeting and certain demographic traits that we know are similar to what a Zola couple looks like.”

This could be just the start of Zola branded merchandise, she acknowledges, saying that “We would love to continue to create items that represent our brand and add utility, playfulness and fun to our couples’ planning process.’

Also on Cullman’s  list of future possibilities: selling the game beyond Zola’s own universe, and “expansion packs going a little bit deeper into certain topics, certain types of couples and relationships.”

“There is a clear appetite for this type of experience,” she declares. “We’ve seen that couples are looking for more experiences that they can do at home. So I really think there’s a ton of potential for this to have more penetration within people at this life stage.”

Although designed for engaged couples, Cullman sees Imagine the Day as having relevance beyond that, “for anyone who’s in a relationship, and anyone who is married.”

One game prompt has particular relevance to her own marriage, she jokes.  “It says, ‘Imagine the day you face very different definitions of what clean means.’ I really wish my husband and I asked each other that before we were married with a child, because that’s the point of contention in our house.”

“There’s a lot of questions that people don’t feel comfortable talking about for a variety of different reasons,” Cullman continues. “That’s why we wanted to give all different couples at different stages tools to have those conversations without feeling like there’s so much pressure and intensity around them.”

Referring to Zola’s larger brand strategy, Cullman describes Imagine the Day as akin to “a physical manifestation of the brand out into the universe. Zola is a modern brand for modern couples, and we really do reflect what the modern couple feels and sees and wants to experience throughout their wedding planning process.”