Love it or hate it, Valentine’s Day is here to stay (and to generate revenue for you). So, why not tap into the potential and launch a powerful influencer campaign or create a whole new trend dedicated to love?
Although Valentine’s Day used to be all about red roses and heart-shaped chocolates, these days, it can be about self-love, celebrating friendship, or even expressing your distaste for this holiday by launching an Anti-Valentine’s Day manifesto. Whatever floats your boat, really!
So, whether you’re all about a classic Valentine’s Day celebration or looking for something entirely new, you’ll find some inspiration in these examples that we’ve rounded up below.
The Body Shop
The Body Shop’s 2021 ‘self-love’ campaign is absolutely worthy of praise. The brand figured out that the members of Gen Z fell into a very sad spot by being the group with the lowest levels of self-love. In response to that, Body Shop launched a worldwide campaign called Self Love Uprising to spread one million acts of self-love throughout the year.
Although The Body Shop did not launch its campaign for Valentine’s Day, there is a lot to learn from it anyway! So take a look below, see how they did it, and try to create something similar, and it will 100% resonate with Gen Z’ers and Millennials.
Burger King
If you’re not one to take Valentine’s Day too seriously, you could always approach it with humor. Take, for instance, this campaign by Burger King and how it tapped into the whole meme sentiment and used UGC to amplify it.
Burger King created an ‘ode to the loneliest man in the world,’ who looked strangely familiar to the famous clown and asked social media users to upload selfies with the ‘nameless’ clown in exchange for a free burger on February 14th.
With this campaign, Burger King managed to deliver a humorous look to Valentine’s Day celebrations and take an ingenious dig at their biggest fast food competitor.
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Pandora
Younger generations tend to stick with influencers who they find ‘relatable.’ So, creating accessible and authentic content with approachable and relevant influencers might just be your best bet. At least that’s what Pandora did by collaborating with Monica Geldart for its Valentine’s Day campaign.
The video is pretty simple, and the scenario is a well-known one, but since Monica puts her own spin on it (because she, as any good influencer, knows what her audience likes!), it becomes not only funny but also genuine and authentic. So, let the influencer do their talking for your Valentine’s Day campaign!
KFC
Valentine’s Day is all about caring about others, and since around 68% of Gen Z’ers think that brands should contribute to society, why not donate to a charitable cause? At least, that is what KFC, a fast-food giant, did.
They collaborated with Baggachips, Cici Coleman, and Jack Finchman to bring the UK “Kentucky Fried Cupid” – a competition where people could enter to win a date with one of the three stars. They also promised to donate 1 pound for each eligible entry to the Comic Relief Foundation.
The bonus of all of this is that young people believe that brands should be socially responsible. So much so that they are willing to change their favorite brands for brands that are more charitable. So, why not show some genuine love to get them on board?
MeUndies
MeUndies, an underwear brand, asked their existing clients who were real-life couples, to share their stories about the moment they knew their relationships were the ‘real deal.’ Then, the brand built its campaign around those stories to promote underwear and enlisted social media influencers to encourage more people to share their Valentine’s Day stories.
It’s a unique approach that’s engaging and highly entertaining. And it’s absolutely inspiring!
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RyanAir
One word – storytelling. A fun or powerful story can captivate even Gen Z’ers with their notoriously short attention spans; knowing this, RyanAir created an irresistible story for their Valentine’s Day campaign.
They took an original spin by basing their story on UGC-boosting hashtags like #EscapeTheNonsense, created awesome video content, and prompted their audiences to share their stories, too.
And you know what? A clever message will always make a brand stand out of the crowd.
Target
Although producing something unique and clever each time you want to promote your brand is ideal, sticking with tired-and-tested tools might also work just fine (after all, they are called ‘tried-and-tested’, not without reason).
Take a look at Target’s video, for instance, where the original poster shows their audience a Valentine’s Day haul they got from the store. It’s simple, it’s cute, and anybody who’s into the whole heart-shaped, pink-colored merch will definitely want to recreate this shopping cart.
Simple, straight to the point, alluring, and simple to recreate!
Takeaway Note
Valentine’s Day is all about love, and that also means showing affection to your customers. So choose something that works for your brand, get cute, and see the love you’ve planted grow!
Really, Valentine’s Day will be there whether you like it or not, so why not tap into it with your own ideas instead of skipping it entirely?
And if you need help with influencer campaigns or learning about what your customers want from you via social listening, we have your back!
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