In the weeks leading up to the most wonderful time of the year – the December Holidays – many luxury brands leveraged the festivities to enhance brand awareness and increase (online) purchases. Under the influence of the western holiday season, even in China the shopping malls and stores were covered in Christmas decorations and brands ran special Christmas and end-of-the-year campaigns. To keep the joyful spirit alive, we’ve listed our favourite December Holiday Campaigns here.
Swarovski
Based on the concept of an Advent Calendar, Swarovski designed a Christmas box with 24 individual compartments that contained three full-priced items and 21 free gifts.
To promote the sale of the shimmering Advent Calendar, priced at 2,980 RMB, Swarovski created a highly engaging and interactive WeChat campaign (H5) that recreated the Advent Calendar experience digitally. Every day, the digital Advent Calendar gave users access to a different interactive mini-game. Upon completing the game, users were given a card. Once seven unique cards were collected, users received a Christmas gift from Swarovski. To maximize chances of winning a price and maximize campaign awareness, users were able to swap cards with friends.
To stimulate purchases of the actual Advent Calendar, the campaign was further supported by a mini program that offered users the opportunity to directly buy the limited-edition Advent Calendar Box through WeChat. By promoting the QR code of the WeChat campaign in their physical stores, Swarovski managed to drive both in-store purchases and awareness of their WeChat platform.
Furla
Italian luxury brand Furla offered its female Chinese audience a quiz to find out what type of charming woman they are. Through a series of multiple-choice questions, the quiz deduced the most charming aspect of the user’s personality – their confidence, passion, mystery, or elegance.
After finishing all questions, the final answer appeared together with a product recommendation that was based on the answers given during the quiz. In addition, the quiz offered some takeaways that the women could share with their friends. Because of the personal questions prior to the product recommendation, women felt the recommendation was more convincing and personalized, making them more willing to share the campaign and ultimately buy the product.
New Look
Following the Western tradition of sending Christmas cards and wishing friends and family happy holidays, New Look designed a mini program that enabled users to create and send Christmas cards featuring New Look’s products via WeChat. Within the mini program, users were asked to choose one of the New Look luxury items, add one photo-effect, and add a line of text with their wish for the reader, for example a “New Look in the New Year”. After finishing the Christmas card, users were able to share the card with their WeChat friends.
Stella McCartney
Stella McCartney’s Christmas Campaign took its followers back to the ‘80s and ‘90s by designing a vintage selfie contest. In a WeChat post introducing the contest, followers were encouraged to click on one of the images which then opened the webpage. On this webpage, users were able to take a selfie or upload one from the photo library on their phone. After uploading a photo, users could customize their selfie with Stella McCartney-themed effects and stickers.
Once finished, the customized photos could be saved and shared onto WeChat’s Moments and/or directly with friends. To encourage the sharing of customized selfies, Stella McCartney asked participants to send their selfies to the brand’s account as well, rewarding the best five selfies with a Christmas gift.
What made these campaigns such a success?
- Engagement. Offering an interesting game or quiz, as these brands did, allows your followers to interact and engage with your brand substantially more than they would if the campaign was merely a post with text and photos.
- Fun experience. Potential consumers are not only stimulated by the possibility of winning something, but also by new and entertaining experiences. Being original and making a campaign fun is therefore just as important as the potential incentives that are given.
- Seamless integration. While an H5 mobile page allows brands to develop a highly interactive and engaging component, mini programs offer a seamless buying experience and integration with WeChat Pay. When deployed simultaneously, these WeChat functionalities present the perfect approach to drive social commerce.
- Sharing is caring. Chinese people love sharing their experiences with their friends. Using this to your advantage is a great way to attract new followers to your Social accounts and increase brand awareness.
