The Campaign

Instead of talking down to Gaokao students from a senior’s perspective like other brands, we wanted to amplify another voice; one that expressed genuine support and understanding from equal companions. Thus, we turned our eyes to those who have been through Gaokao before. Our idea of getting everyone to support Gaokao students – support them, by becoming one of them. With this in mind, we initiated #FullHeartSupport campaign, with ‘My Gaokao Ticket’ H5 on social media. By simply uploading a photo, visitors could get and share a virtual Gaokao ticket of their own, with a ‘younger’ photo made by photo-editing technology. In McDonald’s stores, we placed ‘Gaokao Ticket’ boards for customers to revisit their Gaokao moments. The campaign took them straight back to their Gaokao age, and helped them retrieve empathy to share with current Gaokao students.

Creative Execution

We partnered with the Internet company Meitu to develop the photo-editing technology and generation-specific Gaokao Ticket template. By incorporating these into our H5, every visitor could easily get a virtual Ticket of their own generation, and write their own wishes and support on-site. The H5 site was launched with #FullHeartSupport topic and LTO Campaign on China’s most popular social media platforms – WeChat and Weibo, through both McDonald’s Official social media accounts, and various Internet key opinion leaders ranging from education to entertainment. The online campaign successfully created high engagement and user-generated content, while effectively communicated LTO information. In the meantime, we also placed ‘Gaokao Ticket’ interactive boards as in-store activation, in key McDonald’s stores in Shanghai, to generate more online-to-offline conversion.

Describe the success of the promotion with both client and consumer including some quantifiable results

During campaign period, 17 Million people have visited our H5 site for more than 42 Million times. First time in history, numbers of tickets far exceeded the number of actual exam participants. #FullHeartSupport has successfully become Top 1 commercial topic on Weibo’s Topic Ranking in Education category. Weibo viewership has reached 72 Million; The campaign also resulted in 4 times of sales increase, and achieved 3-year record high in breakfast guest count. As for McDonald’s Breakfast that initiated this movement, every old and new Gaokao participants – that is almost everyone – shall say ‘I’m Lovin’ It’.

Explain why the method of promotion was most relevant to the product or service

Given McDonald’s Breakfast’s objective to boost its McMuffin’s awareness and sales, it launched Crispy Chicken McMuffin Limited Time Offering (LTO) this May. This work served a promotional purpose, as part of the overall integrated LTO campaign, communicating information regarding the LTO to drive in-store traffic. Yet in the meantime, it strived to build strong emotional connection between the consumers and McDonald’s Breakfast brand & McMuffin.

Unlike all the other brands targeting solely at this year’s Gaokao students, we ambitiously wanted to acquire the whole society – with everyone who has taken Gaokao in their life. Through extensive interviews with them, we discovered that they have never forgotten what it was like to face Gaokao, and what they truly needed (and possibly didn’t get). It formed a powerful basis for them to pass their experiences, empathy and support onto this year’s Gaokao students. From there, we turned #FullHeartSupport# into a platform on which every Chinese who attended Gaokao was connected by shared memories and empathy, and joined this movement.