The Campaign

India is a country that loves content and storytelling. So much so that to satisfy demand, Bollywood makes more films per year than any other country. But this is an area where brands have limited access versus creating TVCs or internet based content. In considering how Durex could reach the nation with a branded content message, they immediately focused on digital. While it may not seem the obvious choice due to the limited broadband penetration, it still provides access to over 200 million people across broadband and mobile. Digital also skews towards a younger demographic in India, allowing Durex to better target their primary audience. Furthermore, the medium allows for longer formats than the basic thirty second TVC, enabling us to deliver the brand message while giving it a strong chance of viral distribution in social media channels.

Results

We partnered with Ranveer Singh, a much-loved Bollywood A-Lister and launched a 2-minute film that asked people to celebrate sex by doing a new dance move we called “The Rex”. #DoTheRex delivered a message about safe and consensual sex packed into a Bollywood song and dance. Ranveer Singh used his rapping skills to deliver maximum impact with our audience. The campaign was delivered via YouTube and activated through a series of tactics that included: • YouTube videos and ‘making of’ videos for people wanted to get more involved • A microsite where viewers used their webcams to #dotherex with Ranveer and share their dances through all of their social channels • Activations on Facebook and Twitter that celebrated User Generated Content • Blogger and influencer partnerships with 3 of India's top bloggers • Digital PR and digital media activations

To capture the attention of our audience, we partnered with Ranveer Singh, a much-loved Bollywood A-Lister. We spoke to the Indian people and created conversations about responsible sex by delivering our message in a format the nation already loves: a new Bollywood song and dance. In it, Ranveer asks the audience to celebrate sex with a new dance move. He asks them to #DoTheRex. Once published, we gave our audience the opportunity to share their feelings in comments on all our social channels, or to participate themselves by recoding and uploading their own #DoTheRex dance.

As soon as we posted the #dotherex video, the conversations started. The YouTube video was seen over three million times, and the YouTube comments were filled with debate and conversations from both sides. In social media, the campaign achieved approximately thirty million impressions. This got the conversation trending on Twitter both nationally in India as well as globally. The social media activations inspired User Generated content—from tweets to pictures and videos—all tagged #DoTheRex. This showed that the audiences supported the campaign. Beyond the three blogger partners, the campaign was talked about by many of India's biggest and most influential bloggers. Their conversations took all forms, including very complimentary parody videos from industry stars like Honey Singh and Poonam Pandey who created their own #DoTheRex videos. And without paying for ATL media, we reached a huge audience thanks to coverage by the mainstream Indian press, where over 120 positive sentiment articles were written.