KITKAT ONLINE PRESS CONFERENCE

TitleKITKAT ONLINE PRESS CONFERENCE
BrandNESTLÉ JAPAN
Product / ServiceCONFECTIONARY
CategoryA02. Premiums & Giveaways
EntrantJWT JAPAN Tokyo, JAPAN
Entrant Company:JWT JAPAN Tokyo, JAPAN
DM/Advertising Agency:JWT JAPAN Tokyo, JAPAN

Credits

Name Company Position
Yasuhiko YUASA JWT Japan Account Director
Naoya TAKAHASHI JWT Japan Communication Planner/Producer
Tomoyuki SUMI JWT Japan Animation editor-at-large
Takefumi NITTA mixi Inc. Media Producer
Aya KOUCHI mixi Inc. Media Planner
Ren TSUCHIDO mixi Inc. Web Planner
Yuta IMAI mixi Inc. Engineer

The Brief

Kit Kat, the famous good luck charm for young people in Japan, got renewed for the first time in 37 years and we needed to spread this news and get them to try. Our target, who rely on online media for both information and communication, are unlikely to get influenced by mass advertising. Also product sampling on the street is common in Japan, but most of them end up being in the bin. So we needed to find a new way to spread the info and the samples online.

Creative Execution

The new Kit Kat is crunchier and less sweet to suit Japanese tastes. But these qualities cannot be delivered though TV. So it was crucial that we get people to try it by distributing the samples. The fact that the coupons could be multiplied by writing about it on the mixi pages and given to two friends encouraged people to participate. This giving action was especially appropriate for Kit Kat in Japan, as it is regarded as a giving item to friends and families to wish them good luck or to show their affection.

Describe the creative solution to the brief/objective.

The place we found was mixi, Japan’s largest social network site, with over 20 million members. Using this SNS, we staged Japan’s first virtual press conference to announce the product renewal and to distribute the free virtual sampling coupons. A few days before the conference we leaked the news that we will be giving away free coupons to the first 10,000 people which can be multiplied by writing about it on the mixi pages. To bring more excitement, we announced that there will be a photo opportunity during the conference with Meisa, the celebrity endorser for Kit Kat.

Results

The news about the virtual press conference and the free sampling coupons instantly sparked off immense interest online with over 870,000 people swamping to the site within an hour. As promised, 10,000 people were presented with the coupons which meant that 30,000 people ended up trying the new Kit Kat and spreading the news about it on the mixi pages. The frenzy online poured into the offline world too – more than doubling the sales in just three weeks.