Tag: Contest

Oscar Mayer: Wake Up and Smell the Bacon

If you would like to wake up to the sound of sizzling bacon on the stove and its aroma drawing you out of bed, then head over to www.wakeupandsmellthebacon.com and answer three questions for a chance to win the special bacon-scented iPhone attachment.

The contest is being run by Oscar Mayer, and they are giving away 4700 bacon-scented iPhone attachments over the next month. Winners can then use a custom Oscar Mayer alarm app to automatically activate the iPhone attachment every morning.

How the stunt is engineered

The mechanism is a neat combination of utility and theatre: a giveaway device plus a dedicated alarm app. The theatre is the story-worthy prop that makes the idea easy to retell.

In FMCG marketing, a physical add-on that turns a brand promise into a daily ritual can outperform a one-off ad because it creates repetition without feeling like repetition.

The real question is whether you can turn a product cue into a repeatable moment people choose to replay.

This is a strong stunt because it earns replay inside an existing morning routine, not just in a one-time impression.

Why it lands

This works because the alarm app and scent attachment turn Oscar Mayer’s core cue into a repeatable, at-home sensory demo.

Extractable takeaway: Scent and sound work as marketing when they are attached to an existing habit. If the brand can own a repeatable moment in the day, the campaign shifts from impression to ritual.

It turns a product truth into a sensory demo. Oscar Mayer does not need to persuade you that bacon is appealing. It just recreates the cue that already does the persuading.

It makes the call-to-action playful. “Enter to win” is normally forgettable. Here it is a gateway to a story-worthy object, so the contest itself becomes shareable.

It upgrades branded content into branded utility. Branded utility here means a tool people use for their own sake. The alarm is not only entertainment. It is a behavior change, because the phone becomes part of a new wake-up routine.

Borrowable moves from the bacon alarm

  • Pair a simple app with a tangible artifact. Physical wins feel rarer than digital, which increases talk value, meaning how likely people are to mention it unprompted.
  • Design for daily replay. The strongest “stunts” are the ones that can be re-experienced without needing a second ad.
  • Make the entry mechanic frictionless. Fewer questions, faster entry, and the prize does the marketing.

A few fast answers before you act

What is being promoted here?

A contest for a bacon-scented iPhone attachment, supported by an alarm app that triggers the attachment in the morning.

Why does this qualify as more than a gimmick?

Because it converts a brand promise into a repeatable experience. The “demo” happens in the user’s real life, not just on screen.

What is the main behavior change the campaign creates?

It pulls the brand into a daily wake-up habit, which creates repeated exposure without needing repeated media placements.

What makes it shareable?

The object is inherently story-worthy. People can describe it instantly, and the idea is unusual enough to travel as a headline.

What is the key risk?

Link rot and platform change. If the app link, device compatibility, or contest site stops working, the core mechanic collapses.

Ikea Social Catalogue

IKEA has been innovating every year with their classic paper catalog. In Norway they decide to take this classic paper catalog and make a social media version of it. With zero budget, they ask their 130,000 Facebook and Instagram fans to post the page of their favourite product on Instagram and add the hashtag #ikeakatalogen, for the chance of winning that product.

How the Social Catalogue works

The mechanic is intentionally lightweight. Here, “mechanic” means the single action IKEA asks for. One public photo of a catalogue page plus one hashtag. IKEA asks fans to pick their favourite item from the catalogue, photograph the page, and post it publicly so the product becomes discoverable through personal networks. Over time, more and more items get documented and shared by real people, effectively recreating the catalogue as a social feed.

In retail and consumer brands with large owned distribution like catalogues, the cheapest growth loops come from turning existing browsing moments into public signals.

The real question is whether your owned channel can become a prompt people want to publicly share, instead of a one-way broadcast they only consume.

Why print is the trigger, not the limitation

Most brands treat print as a one-way broadcast. Here, print is the starting gun. The physical catalogue becomes the prompt that drives people online, and the content that fuels sharing is already in consumers’ hands. Print is not the limitation. It is the trigger when you design the handoff into social indexing.

Extractable takeaway: If you can turn an owned, offline touchpoint into a simple public posting behaviour, you get both social proof and a self-building product index without paying for equivalent distribution.

The growth loop is built into social behaviour

The “social” part is not a slogan. It is distribution mechanics. The hashtag makes individual posts browsable beyond the poster’s own network, so every new post increases discoverability for the next one. When someone posts their chosen page, their network sees it. That drives curiosity, repeats the behaviour, and compounds reach without buying equivalent media.

What to steal

  • Use an owned asset as the trigger. The catalogue is already shipped. The campaign rides that distribution.
  • Make participation effortless. One photo and one hashtag, then you are in.
  • Let the audience do the indexing. Fans effectively organise and surface products through what they choose to share.
  • Reward desire, not trivia. The prize is the exact thing the person already wants.

A few fast answers before you act

What is the IKEA Social Catalogue?

A campaign that turns the printed IKEA catalogue into a social feed by asking people to photograph and share their favourite pages with #ikeakatalogen for a chance to win the featured product.

What is the core behaviour it uses?

People naturally share things they want. The campaign turns that impulse into distribution and product discovery.

What does the hashtag do in this mechanic?

It collects individual posts into one browsable stream, so products stay discoverable beyond the original poster’s friends and followers.

Why is this effective for retail?

Because it turns product browsing into social proof, and social proof into incremental reach, without asking people to learn a new behaviour.

What is the simplest version to replicate?

Pick one existing owned channel, define one shareable action, and reward the exact item the person publicly chooses.

Marmite: Bringing Home the Kiwis

A centenary gift that tastes like home

Sanitarium Marmite is a Kiwi staple and a national icon of 100 years. Today, one in five Kiwis live abroad. Many of these 600,000 Kiwis miss their Marmite, as it is hard to get overseas.

So to commemorate its 100th year in New Zealand, Ogilvy Auckland launched a contest which reunited long-lost Kiwis with their homeland and everything they love about it, including Marmite.

The mechanic: one-way tickets as a proof of intent

All the interested candidates had to do was tell the Marmite judges what makes them, or their loved ones, a deserving candidate to avail one of the 100 one-way free air tickets from anywhere in the globe. The one-way ticket is the proof of intent, because it commits the brand to the reunion, not just a symbolic gesture.

A diaspora is the portion of a country’s people living overseas, often staying emotionally tied to “home” through food, language, sport, and ritual.

Marmite’s “Bringing Home the Kiwis” is a centenary contest that offered 100 one-way flights to bring overseas New Zealanders back home, using the return itself as the campaign’s emotional centerpiece.

In small countries with a large diaspora, local brands can act as a bridge by enabling a real reunion.

Why it lands: it makes nostalgia actionable

Most “homesickness” marketing stays symbolic. This one turns longing into logistics. The prize is not merchandise. It is presence. That is why the story travels. It is instantly understandable, and emotionally high-stakes without feeling manufactured.

Extractable takeaway: When the emotion is separation, the strongest brand move is a mechanism that creates presence, not another object that points to it.

The business intent behind the generosity

The brand is buying disproportionate meaning. Marmite becomes a shorthand for “home,” and the campaign demonstrates it through a gesture people talk about long after the winners land.

It also solves a real friction point in the insight. If the product is hard to get abroad, then “bring them back” is a bolder way to dramatize what the brand represents.

This is the right kind of generosity when your brand promise is “home” and your audience’s friction is distance.

The real question is whether you are willing to make your positioning physically true for a small number of people, rather than symbolically true for everyone.

Nice idea, but it is clearly in the same family as “bring them home” diaspora campaigns, including JWT Argentina’s 2009 effort, titled “Bring Home the Argentinians”.

What to steal if you want a diaspora idea that is more than a slogan

  • Use a prize that embodies the insight. Flights beat gift packs when the emotion is separation.
  • Keep entry simple, but make the stories rich. Let candidates supply the narrative energy.
  • Build a clear number hook. “100 for 100 years” is easy to remember and retell.
  • Make the payoff visible. Arrivals and reunions are the credibility layer, not a voiceover.

A few fast answers before you act

What is Marmite’s Bringing Home the Kiwis campaign?

It is a centenary contest that offered 100 one-way flights from anywhere in the world to bring overseas New Zealanders back home. People nominate themselves or loved ones with a short story, tying the brand to the emotional idea of “home”.

Why does the “one-way ticket” prize work so well?

Because it turns nostalgia into logistics. The reward is presence, not merchandise, so the brand promise feels demonstrated rather than advertised.

Why is “100 for 100 years” a smart structure?

It is a simple number hook that is easy to remember and retell. It also makes the generosity feel purposeful instead of arbitrary.

What is the real business intent behind the generosity?

Marmite buys disproportionate meaning and becomes shorthand for “home,” while dramatizing a real friction point. It is hard to get abroad, so the campaign makes “home” the centerpiece.

What makes the story travel beyond New Zealand?

The payoff is visible and universal. Arrivals and reunions act as the credibility layer, so the idea works as a story, not just a claim.

What should other brands copy from this pattern?

If your positioning is emotional, make the mechanic physical. Choose a prize that embodies the insight, keep entry simple, and let real people supply the narrative energy.