The Campaign

When researching about Chan’s fans, Maybelline found out that his fan-base is not only massive; they are ultra protective too. They name themselves his “Queens”, meaning they protect Chan like queen protects her king. There were instances where Chan’s agent had to stop Chan’s endorsement deals because his fans thought the brands are not good fit for Chan.

Creative Execution

First, Maybelline renamed one of the lipstick shades “Queen”, and made it the star color of the range. Chan posed with the lipstick and released the promotional photos on his social media, hinting his endorsement. Maybelline then officially revealed Chan as a spokesperson. Meanwhile, the brand announced the “Queen” shade as an exclusive color for Chan’s fans. Maybelline created an interactive page with a 40 second video starred by Chan. Fans can choose different scenarios to follow different storylines with Chan. Although massively popular in China, Chan is yet to be more recognized internationally. Maybelline wanted to elevate Chan’s stardom even more. We featured Chan on the one and only Time Square in New York, making him one of the few Chinese celebrities to be ever featured at Time Square.

We made Chan’s fans the absolute front and center of the campaign, and they answered with stunning enthusiasm. Chan’s new endorsement topic was viewed 390 million times on social media site Weibo with more 1 million discussions. Chan’s interactive videos were viewed nearly 1 million times. 30,000 fans uploaded their photos to win a chance to be featured alongside Chan on a Time Square billboard. The “Queen” lipsticks were sold out in 20 seconds. Fans wanted the color so desperately that ßthey wrote to Chan’s agent requesting for more. After re-stock, another 20,000 were sold in 2 hours, breaking Maybelline’s e-commerce sales record.

In this era of fan economy, we cannot ignore the power and impact of stars and their fans. How can Maybelline, a young and fashion brand best leverage this opportunity and create business impact? We found the answer in our integrated Media approach. Taking advantage of our famous spokesperson, we create great enthusiasm from his fans about our lipstick through social media, outdoor display, videos, and Html 5 pages. Without any of these elements in this integrated campaign, we cannot be such successful. As a result, the topic was viewed 390million times and the lipstick were sold out in 20seconds.

Insights, Strategy and the Idea

Maybelline New York hired Hong Kong singer and actor William Chan to be brand ambassador to promote the Color Sensational lipstick range. Chan starred in several idol dramas and has gained massive popularity among Maybelline’s young, female target audience – and as you can imagine, they are also the target audience of many other brands. Maybelline can’t just hire Chan to do a few commercials and hope the fans will willingly buy the products. The brand had to show we respect them, and cared for Chan’s career as much as the “queens” do.