My role: Sr. Social Media Manager, Social Strategist, Copywriter
Stalking our fans was literally one of our micro-campaign ideas.
OBJECTIVE
TV, as a category, is a very saturated market. TV shows must be launched strategically to gain large-scale awareness, attract social engagement, and drive weekly tune-in.
For the launch of Stephen King’s thriller show adaptation of Mr. Mercedes about a friendly neighborhood psychopathic killer (who drives an ice cream truck and works in I.T.), we saw this as a creativity opportunity to bring this character to life on social.
STRATEGY
Mr. Mercedes came with an existing cult following of die-hard fans who expected to find a deeper relationship with the show and its characters.
We created over 400 pieces of original social content to support the show across micro-campaigns, evergreen posts, activations and a chatbot that coerced fans into the twisted world of a psychopath. We used each social platform to tell a different part of the story in a way that was native and organic to each platform.
Instagram became Brady’s (the psychopathic main character) personal channel where every piece of content was through his POV (i.e. spying through bushes).
Facebook became the central hub for recapping top moments that rallied the fan community and also pushing news articles and exclusive content. We also hosted several FB LIVE with the cast answering fan questions in real-time.
On Twitter, we ramped up on community management and interrupted our fans' timelines every Wednesday at 8PM ET/PT to a live-tweet season.
RESULTS
Over 15 Million people reached through social
Over 1 Million social engagements
Grew a following from 0 to 100K+ fans
55.3 Million views of custom gifs on GIPHY
77,000+ messages exchanged over the Chatbot
As a result of our efforts, Mr. Mercedes was picked for a second season.
Outside of the main social platforms, we also look for creative transmedia opportunities. Here’s how we put a psychopath to good use through a messenger chatbot.
The chatbot became a direct channel to communicate throughout the season and drive weekly tune-in, turning the fan-engagement device into a marketing channel of its own. Essentially, our chatbot became the millennial-ready version of eCRM. Except this program talked back. And it was creepy as hell.
The chatbot became a real-world, immersive, be-a-part-of-the-show digital extension of the brand, and a real treat for fans that complemented the show narrative. We even inserted ourselves into the experience by posing as Brady and stalked our fans online, sending real-life stalking videos looking through our fans' profile pictures and even their entire profiles. Our chatbot interactions were so immersive that fans even asked if they were talking to a real person.
The Yellow Smiley was an iconic piece from the show. We took this insight and transformed it by creating a suite of reactionary GIFs that were in the tone of the show. Also used for fan engagement.
Mr. Mercedes made a cultural impact. The emoji keyboard will never look the same to our fans.
We really had a lot of fun pushing the limits with the sadistic, taunting, dark-humor tone of voice of the show through fan engagements.
Fan love is what it’s all about.
