Krispy Kreme is a household name, notorious for its original glazed doughnuts and barista coffee. In 2019 Krispy Kreme boosted sales with Instagram by taking it back to basics. Releasing four retro doughnut flavours inspired by childhood classics. Fairy bread, choc brownie batter, cookie dough and finger bun coining it the throwback party range.
A taste of childhood
Krispy Kreme is a notorious doughnut brand. They decided to remind millennials why they are so well-loved. With a nostalgic digital campaign, Krispy Kreme wanted to remind Australian’s why they love doughnuts by tapping into cultural trends and using the latest technology to increase relevance amongst a whole new audience.
Nostalgia and retro throwbacks had become one of the biggest trends of the year. Krispy Kreme launched a selection of retro mobile arcade games, turning its Instagram profile into a virtual arcade for its followers.
The mobile games celebrated four new doughnut flavours released as part of The Throwback Party range. Each game was inspired by a classic 1990s video game, including Finger Bun Fighter, Krispy Kart, Fairy Bread Fantasy and Choc-Brownie Bash.
Boosting sales with Instagram
To drive awareness, Krispy Kreme promoted the games via photo and video ads in Instagram feed and Stories. Before this campaign, Krispy Kreme Australia had seen a significant increase in the number of Instagram Story views and wanted to find a way to take advantage of this trend and take a creative idea to the next level.
People could swipe straight from the ads in Stories to load a virtual retro-inspired handheld game console on their screens. Players didn’t have to leave the Krispy Kreme Instagram world and could play the games right there in Stories and then return to Krispy's profile to switch games and play some more.
A leaderboard tracked the high scores of players, with the top players on the leaderboard winning either a three-month, six-month or one-year supply of Krispy Kreme doughnuts.
“The ease of entry and customer-centric nature of Instagram let us choose this university loved and widely used platform. By using Instagram, an app our target audience is highly active on. We could create a seamless user experience that was fun and engaging. We have seen incredible brand results, far exceeding our expectations.”
Russell Schulman, Former CMO, Krispy Kreme Australia
The icing on top
The five-week campaign ran across April and May 2019 and achieved:
- A 25-point increase in ad recall
- A 33-point increase in unique users
- 51% increase in the number of mobile users visiting the website
- 30% increase in eCommerce sales, year over year
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