Unilever's bleach brand Domestos conducted a social experiment with influencers to generate awareness and solicit donations for restroom hygiene in local schools.
Objective
The economic crisis that began to escalate at the end of 2021, driven by rising inflation, posed a significant challenge for Unilever's Domestos, the premium brand in the disinfectant category. Unilever's solution was to differentiate itself within the category. Most category communications primarily conveyed the product's promise and performance through functional messages, but Unilever recognized the importance of appealing to the emotional side of consumers.
Context
First, Unilever aimed to remind consumers of Domestos' consistently high performance. Then, with its social purpose communication, Unilever approached consumers with a warmer tone to strengthen the emotional connection between them and Domestos. Unilever decided to invest in a strategy that would elevate its "brand power" rather than engaging in price competition.
Unilever's project aimed to increase the visibility of Domestos' School Hygiene Program — a program that has contributed to sustainable toilet hygiene in primary and middle schools for eleven years — and create social awareness about the program's content. Unilever strove for an increase in brand power and an improvement in brand value scores.
Target Audience
The target audience for this campaign included the general public, parents and guardians of primary and middle school students, and individuals within the primary and middle school education community.
Creative and Media Strategy
To understand the feelings of children who lack access to hygienic school toilets, Unilever planned a social experiment using influencer participants. Unilever asked the participants, "What do some children do when school toilets are not clean enough?" and then simulated the experience. Unilever and its participants learned how challenging it is to hold restroom needs all day during classes because the toilets are not clean. Unilever posted the social experiment video that vividly portrayed the difficulties experienced by some children who have to hold restroom needs in due to unclean toilets during a school day on digital platforms. Unilever utilized the social media posts of the influencer participants who were part of the experiment to promote the video, showcasing an innovative approach to influencer utilization.
The content shared by influencers consisted of their real-life experiences in the classroom without using the restroom, enhancing its relatability. The influencers empathized with children by sharing their personal experiences and voicing the difficulties students face. Influencers invited their followers to make a Domestos donation to their chosen school by scanning the QR code found in the video or by clicking on the link in their stories.
To further increase the impact of the awareness Unilever created with its social experiment video and provide more hygiene support to schools, the company took its campaign to the field. Unilever constructed Turkey's largest QR code and placed it in popular Istanbul locations, Buyaka and Galataport Istanbul, creating a highly interactive outdoor campaign. Unilever's influencers announced the event to their followers and shared images from the event area. This approach allowed Unilever to make thousands of Domestos donations to schools all over the country from participants who visited its project, further enhancing the campaign.
Unilever's Domestos' brand power scores and average image values saw a quarterly increase in 2022.
Domestos' social purpose score (SLP) started at an average of 64.5 in the first three quarters but grew to 77 in the last quarter when its social purpose campaign was running.
Results of the Social Purpose and QR campaigns:
The campaign did not aim to affect product sales and market dynamics. Instead, Unilever created awareness among people with its social experiment that generated an intense sense of empathy, and it supported this with free product donations.
The success of the campaign was evident from the fact that:
In 2022, the pandemic had ended, the demand for hygiene products had decreased, and the economic crisis intensified. Unilever's Domestos, a premium bleach in its category, maintained the success it achieved during the pandemic with brand power, and not with price games.
