#MissionForeverFriend with Hill’s Pet Nutrition

Covid-19 saw an incredible spike in new pet owners throughout the UK, with an estimated 3.2 million pets purchased throughout this time to help with lockdown loneliness. However, many did not consider the long-term commitment, and coupled with rising living costs, animal rescue centres up and down the country were inundated with abandoned pets in the aftermath of the pandemic. We were tasked by Hill’s Pet Nutrition to support a month-long campaign in partnership with Raystede Centre for animal welfare and Woodgreen pets’ charity in an extension of the brand’s 365 day-a-year commitment to helping shelter pets. The campaign would run throughout the month of April and would motivate pet owners up and down the country to snap and share a photo of their pet using #MissionForeverFriend on Instagram and Facebook to trigger a donation to one of the participating partner shelters, courtesy of Hill’s. The target? 100,000 donations in just one month.

To drum up 100,000 donations, we needed a multi-channel approach using both social and traditional consumer media, to gain wide-spread awareness. We knew the commercial nature of the initiative wouldn’t be enough to drive national news coverage alone, so we teamed up with celebrity tier influencer and media-worthy ambassador, Gemma Atkinson.

Photography and video of Gemma with her own pets Ollie and Norman were created which added authenticity to the appeal, whilst a powerful supportive quote was crafted to include in press materials. Armed with this bank of assets, a series of social posts were drip-fed throughout the month driving Gemma’s 1.6 million followers to the Hill’s pages encouraging people to take a selfie with their pet using the campaign hashtag. Press releases were issued to media, both consumer and vet professional, alongside the striking photography of Gemma with her beloved pets.

 

We knew from our experience of managing Hill’s social pages that sharing UGC content would be key throughout the campaign period, and so we amplified this by enlisting 10 micro-influencers who offered a consistent theme of heart-warming images and videos of pets living their best life with Hill’s to generate high levels of reach, engagement, and trusted endorsement of the brand.

Video content was taking over the social space also at this time with 85% of users wanting brands to create more video content, therefore we ensured Instagram Reels and Stories featured throughout to drive mass awareness and to strengthen the message of the campaign.

 

The campaign was a huge success, with key highlights including:
• 13 pieces of media coverage including Glamour, Hello!, Daily Star and gold vet title, Veterinary Times
• 27,803 total engagements on Facebook
• 683,198 total reach on Instagram
And importantly, Hill’s met the 100,000 meal donation goal one week before the completion of the campaign.