The Campaign

Although, the “coconut sable” is a cookie product, due to no available budget for its PR, the product image had been taken as just "out-dated" for a long time, by which young generation turned away from it. Without buying any mass-media, it was a challenge to restore the fans of the product among the youth. Instead of advertisements, a music band made a debut from a record company. The band consists of junior high school girls who have extreme performing technique. The band name was encrypted. In a flash, the music was ranked 5th on iTunes. In a week, its play counts came up to 1,900,000. After the riddle of the band name was solved that it was a pun of the product name, the product awareness, its favorable impression and its sales volume sky-rocketed all at once.

The Brief

Despite not making any changes in the product itself, sales of “coconut sable” dramatically increased reaching to 133% against that as of the previous month. Number of the relevant tweets by the youth to support the product exceeded 60,000. (At that time, Number of the tweets to support the competitive products was just 8,000, although those products were also on TV commercial.) Number of the reaches on SNS came up to 63,000,000 impressions.

Results

< Play counts of the Music Video (MV) > Within a week after the publicity of the MV, marked 1,800,000 times The music was also ranked 5th on iTunes. < News on the band > The band has been taken up by various media like CNN, Yahoo! & Fuji Television etc. in 39 countries world-wide. < Number of tweets by the youth / March only > 67,518 tweets < Number of reaches entirety on SNS / March only > 63,190,000 impressions < Sales volume of the product > Despite of not making any changes in the product itself, Sales of “coconut sable” as of March 2015 have achieved to 133% against that as of the previous month.

Execution

Distribution of the Music Video (MV) had started on the website since March 3, 2015 in advance. In a week, the MV play counts came up to 1,900,000. Also, the music was ranked 5th on iTunes. Right after taking all those attentions, on March 19, 2015, it was announced in public that the band had been formally organized for “coconut sable” in particular and their live concert followed. After that, the band appeared on music programs while spending zero yen on mass-media to proceed with further branding. Also, to let the junior high school girl’s band acquire extreme performing technique, the complete music had been split into 3 pieces for drum parts & 5 pieces for guitar parts.

The Situation

This year is the 50th anniversary of the cookie, “coconut sable”. Brand image of the product as "out-dated" had made young generation turned away from it, which was truly a serious issue. No budget was prepared to buy mass-media. Without buying mass-media, it was a big challenge to change the youths minds.

The Strategy

The media to brand the product in line with the band and the music was developed. Spending zero yen on mass-media, the campaign contributed to change the mind of the target generation effectively who were difficult to be inspired by means of TV commercials. Also, by launching the second version of a single record & performing the live concert, medium-and-long term branding was stabilized.