#The8N8 Twitter Campaign

A celebrity tweets a question about the new Nokia N8. You spot the clue, follow the celebrity, and race to reply with the correct answer before everyone else. Do it fast enough, and you earn the follow-back. Repeat until you have eight.

The brief. Launching the Nokia N8 on Twitter

Wunderman Buenos Aires is given the task to launch the new Nokia N8 smart phone. They create a Twitter-based activation campaign called #The8N8.

How it works. Clues, speed, and follow-backs

  • Nokia enlists top celebrities to tweet questions, clues, and features of the phone.
  • Users find the clues, follow the celebrity, and respond correctly in the fastest time.
  • The reward is the celebrity following the user back.
  • The first eight people to get eight celebrities to follow them back win the new Nokia N8.

Results. Reach and follower growth

The campaign reaches 300,000 Twitter users. It also increases Nokia’s fan base on Twitter and Facebook by over 100%.


A few fast answers before you act

What is #The8N8?
A Twitter-based activation by Wunderman Buenos Aires to launch the Nokia N8.

What do participants actually do?
Follow participating celebrities, answer their clue tweets correctly, and do it faster than others to earn follow-backs.

What is the win condition?
Be among the first eight people to get eight celebrities to follow you back.

What are the reported outcomes?
Reach of 300,000 Twitter users and fan base growth on Twitter and Facebook by over 100%.

What is the transferable mechanic?
Turn product messaging into a speed-based game that rewards social proof. In this case, the follow-back.

Hire Us: Twitter Follow Stunt Lands a Job

Dutch creative team Bas van de Poel and Daan van Dam set up five separate Twitter accounts and started following various Dutch Creative Directors on Twitter. Their message was simple: HIRE US.

Even though the idea is very similar to the Jeep Twitter Puzzle campaign, the execution is different and innovative. It gets them noticed and finally a job with Boondoggle in Amsterdam.

Why five accounts is the point, not the gimmick

The mechanism is engineered repetition. One account can be ignored. Five accounts create a pattern. When multiple new followers arrive with the same blunt message, it triggers curiosity and a small sense of social pressure. Someone is doing something intentional, and it is hard not to look.

It is also highly targeted. They do not broadcast “hire us” into the void. They place it directly in the attention stream of the people who can change their outcome.

In attention-scarce professional markets, the fastest way to get noticed is to use a platform’s native behaviors to deliver a message that is instantly legible.

Why it lands: interruption plus clarity

This works because it is instantly legible. No clever puzzle to decode. No long portfolio pitch. The call to action is the entire creative idea. That clarity is what makes it feel confident.

And because it happens inside Twitter’s native behaviours. following, notifications, profile clicks. it does not require extra friction. The recipient can react in seconds.

The intent: turn hiring into a creative brief

The business intent is obvious. get hired. But the deeper intent is to reframe the hiring process. Instead of asking for a meeting, they create a live demonstration of how they think. targeted, lightweight, and culturally fluent in the medium.

What to steal if you are marketing yourself

  • Be specific about who you want. Target decision-makers, not “everyone”.
  • Design an interruption that fits the platform. Use native behaviours, not extra hoops.
  • Make the message instantly legible. One idea. one line. no explanation required.
  • Turn the ask into proof. Show your creativity in the method, not in a PDF pitch.
  • Keep it respectful and reversible. Clever is good. spammy is not.

A few fast answers before you act

What did Bas van de Poel and Daan van Dam actually do?

They created five Twitter accounts and followed Dutch Creative Directors with a single message: “HIRE US”.

Why did using multiple accounts matter?

It created a noticeable pattern and a stronger interruption than a single follow, prompting curiosity and profile clicks.

How is this different from the Jeep Twitter Puzzle?

It is similar in spirit, but the execution is simpler and more direct. a single clear call to action rather than a puzzle mechanic.

What made it effective as self-promotion?

High targeting, low friction, and a message that communicates confidence in one second.

What is the main takeaway for personal branding?

If you want attention from decision-makers, design a small, platform-native experience that demonstrates how you think and makes the next step easy.

Assembling manuals in 140 characters

The challenge furniture brand Tok&Stok faced was how to communicate that they sell easy to assemble furniture. If one is not an Ikea, the task doesn’t seem to be easy. However agency DDB Brazil cracked it with a cool Twitter-based campaign where the assembling manuals were reduced to a maximum of 140 characters and posted as tweets!

To view the tweets from the campaign visit Tok&Stok’s Twitter account.