Plastic pollution is at a critical point, and feminine hygiene brand Lil-Lets is acting on it. We launched their social campaign against single-use plastic by grounding on strategy, education, and entertainment, earning them more fans who also care for the environment.
The backstory
Plastic is everywhere: on remote Arctic sea ice, inside birds’ stomachs, and in our most intimate feminine hygiene products. Each year, 350 million tonnes of plastic is produced worldwide and half of it only used once. At this pace, there could be less fish in the sea by 2050 than discarded plastic, which can take thousands of years to degrade. Faced with this sobering evidence of our footprint on Earth, UK-based feminine hygiene brand Lil-Lets chose to educate, inspire, and encourage women to make a difference by saying no to single-use plastic found in applicator tampons. To help them kick off their mission, we partnered with Lil-Lets to create a branded social campaign grounded in social strategy. We came up with a series of visual assets to turn plastic pollution into a relatable problem and help our client win fans across various social platforms. How did we manage to stand out from the noise, you ask? By doing two things we love: delivering our content to the right people at the right time and using a generous dose of entertainment.
The insight
Through social listening, we collected valuable insights on our target audience and how they engage with the plastic conversation across various social platforms. We identified conversation starter keywords, such as ‘plastic bags’, and our friends at Dream Quickly used them to develop analogies that quantify the impact of applicator tampons on the environment–such as “the amount of plastic in applicator tampons used during one average period is the equivalent of 11 plastic bags”.
We also took into account heated debates about plastic pollution and assessed how to stay away from them. Entertainment allowed us to stand out within existing conversations about plastic pollution and helped us forge a relationship with our target audience through a shared sense of humour.
The creative
To maximise reach and drive engagement through to action, we delivered this social campaign over organic and paid, and split it into three interlinked phases through the conversion funnel:
Awareness: To raise awareness about plastic pollution in relation to applicator tampons, the information needed to be relatable and easy to digest. Our analogies translated the global problem of plastic pollution into a personal matter of consumer choice. We partnered with magician Katherine Mills to bring the numbers to life and earn the attention and curiosity of our target audience.
Education: Next, we wanted to inspire our audience to take action against plastic pollution by switching to plastic-free tampons.
Taking extra care to not make anyone feel guilty or ashamed of using applicator tampons (no finger pointing here), we created assets that are informative and encouraging–such as a ‘how to’ guide for first-time users about how to insert non-applicator tampons by using their finger instead of a plastic applicator.
Action: Finally, humourous social assets were created to encourage consumers to try non-applicator tampons. The play on words “give plastic the finger” was used as a call to action highlighting the plastic pollution problem while also reminding users that they already have a more sustainable alternative to plastic applicators on hand (literally!).
We used shoppable assets and interactive elements throughout our social tests and learnings to regularly optimise our content and refine our targeting and retargeting strategies. In other words: we made sure we were delivering each of our assets to the right people, at the right time.
To strengthen the proposition by building a stronger and more personal relationship with our younger audience, we partnered with UK-based lifestyle influencers who fit well with Lil-Lets’ brand voice and have good engagement rates. We planned a social timeline using influencer assets to push the rest of the campaign across social channels.
The Evidence
This campaign’s results surpassed our client’s expectations as well as all our own targets.
We reached every woman in our target audience, twice.
Through our optimisation, we reduced the cost of media below 50% of the industry average.
Here are some numbers that speak for themselves:
The magic
By keeping Lil-Lets values and tone of voice in mind, and carefully studying our target audience, we produced and optimised a campaign that was informative, fun, and strategic. Perhaps best of all, we brought sustainable consumerism close to heart for a host of new Lil-Lets fans.
“Working with Distillery has been an eye opener. They eat social for breakfast and have a true understanding of media dynamics. They have effortlessly helped us to tell our campaign story, effectively retargeting consumers across platforms. It’s been fantastic to work so collaboratively because Distillery is always agile to respond with creative content ideas that drive results.”