OgilvyAction launches innovative digital initiative to promote Wetherspoons

Ogilvy Action has launched a highly engaging and innovative digital initiative to promote national pub chain Wetherspoon to a student audience, in partnership with Bacardi Brown-Forman Brands (BBFB).

The campaign will position Wetherspoon as the perfect destination for students’ weekly “Big Night Out” with its “Unlock Your Night @Wetherspoons” app.

“Wetherspoon Unlocked” is a mobile augmented reality app, available for iPhone and Android that allows consumers to discover or “unlock” unique food and drink offers hidden on POS sited within 280 participating Wetherspoon pubs. POS will also be placed on actual university campuses to drive student awareness of the activity and encourage downloading of the app.

Accessed through a QR code, the iPhone store or Android Market, the app harnesses the latest Aurasma augmented reality technology to deliver real time value-added offers to consumers whilst they are in the pubs.

Food and drink offers are represented by different brightly coloured geometric shapes on stickers and bar mats within bars, encouraging customers to find out more about the promotion. The POS carries intriguing messages such as “look closer”, “be curious”, and “question everything”, aimed at attracting the interest of an audience of early adopters.

The app will also allow consumers to tag videos and pictures of their Wetherspoon “Big Night Out” to objects within the bar which can then be accessed by their Facebook friendship groups on subsequent visits to the pub. Content can also be directly tagged and updated to twitter and Facebook through the app.

To drive awareness of the campaign Ogilvy Action teamed up with student website, Studentbeans.com and Campus Media, delivering a far reaching and highly targeted communication plan incorporating eCRM, online advertising, campus POS and the use of student ambassadors.

Commenting on the campaign, Jason Wall, director at Ogilvy Action said: “Wetherspoon and Bacardi briefed us to increase student footfall to their outlets whilst positioning Wetherspoon as an ideal destination for a big night out. We know that this audience has a wide variety of options for socialising and that the best nights out are full of shared, spontaneous experiences.

“Creating talkability and providing genuine social added value were key elements that we needed to deliver within the campaign. Students tend to be early adopters so we also knew that we needed to harness the latest digital technology and allow for social media sharing.  We believe we have built all of these elements into our Wetherspoon Unlocked campaign.”

Jonathan Fearn at BBFB added: “With current consumption habits increasingly taking people away from drinking in pubs, particularly within the student population, we were keen to develop a campaign that supported Wetherspoon as one of our key trade partners and encouraged people to look to them as a perfect venue for their nights out.

“We know that students are traditionally early adopters of technology and keen to embrace campaigns that add to their nights out with friends and facilitate social sharing. By utilising the latest augmented reality technology, we have been able to develop a mechanic that delivers unique offers, whilst also providing the platform that allows groups to tag and upload digital memories of their nights out to physical items in the pubs, in addition to directly linking through to Facebook and Twitter accounts. We believe our campaign has all the right ingredients to get our target audience talking and visiting their local Wetherspoon to check out our activity for themselves”.

Wetherspoon’s chief executive, John Hutson, said: “Our pubs are extremely popular with students and we are confident that they will embrace the promotion. It is a fun and innovative way for our pubs to interact with students and for students to benefit when they visit their local Wetherspoon.”

Wetherspoon Unlocked will roll out from 12th September targeting 280 of the company’s pubs, which have a student base. Search Wetherspoon Unlocked to locate the app on Apple and Android app stores.

Originally posted on the Field Marketing and Brand Experience website.