Campaign: Credit Crunch Beauty
Client: Forest Laboratories (Sudocrem)
PR team: Woolley Pau PR
Timescale: JanuaryAugust 2009
Budget: £10,000
Woolley Pau PR was asked to launch Sudocrem Skin Care Cream in a way that would engage women and create standout in a very competitive market.
Objectives
- To change the perception that the Sudocrem brand is only for babies
- To communicate the benefits of Sudocrem to women and emphasise the new product's relevance to adult skincare.
Strategy and plan
Twitter, Facebook and beauty blogs revealed a cult following of adult and celeb Sudocrem users including Amanda Holden and Cheryl Cole. So a campaign was created around the hook of celebrities using Sudocrem as a credit-crunch beauty product. The PR team created a budget press launch, with journalists sent a coffee and a press pack, and invited to come up with their own credit-crunch beauty tip. Consumer research was used to identify the cost of beauty and provide money-saving tips.
Measurement and evaluation
More than 100 articles were generated across digital and print media, including in the Daily Mail, Reveal, Heat, Grazia, Celebs on Sunday and News of the World. The product was hailed as ideal for treating spots and unsightly blemishes by the Mail, and dubbed the supermodel and beauty editor's SOS staple by Grazia.
Results
Sales of Sudocrem Skin Care Cream exceeded target level by ten per cent.
HINDSIGHT
Pauline Kent, Director, Woolley Pau PR
Sudocrem is a fantastic brand with an amazing heritage, but the launch of Sudocrem Skincare Cream posed a real challenge. How to secure endorsement, brand awareness and maximise social media in the highly competitive mainstream skincare market? We knew it wasn't going to be easy and decided that three key words - persistence, audacity and reputation - should shape our thinking.
It took audacity to take on our client and challenge the brief; in particular the request to position the product as a travel essential. Our starting point was to identify the opportunity within the media, to look at what was topical and to propose to our client that the product was positioned as the essential skincare cream for smart women who are cash-conscious. The fact that our research showed we had celebrity support for the brand was a huge help and gave the whole creative platform of 'Credit Crunch Beauty' a certain sex appeal.
It took persistence to make the idea ignite in the media and the team worked hard to ensure every medium from tabloids to Twitter was used.
The results exceed our expectations. We had hoped to give mainstream skincare brands with big budgets a run for their money, but to have secured over 100 items of coverage, and to discover that another well respected PR agency has used 'Credit Crunch Beauty' as a case study during a creative training session, gave us all a massive buzz. Best of all, it supported the strong reputation of the Sudocrem brand and delivered real results through increased sales.
