#LEAwards 2021 highlight: GATSBY makes its mark in male grooming category

While male grooming has been gaining popularity across the globe, Asia had only just begun to catch up. GATSBY saw that male grooming in Singapore was confined to basics, and wanted to promote its facial wipes. GATSBY then launched #10SecSwag, to deliver the message that consumers look their best in just 10 seconds. #10SecSwag was met with resounding success as GATSBY achieved more than what it had targeted for this campaign. GATSBY’s ability to tap into a growing consumer base and making its mark before larger competitors impressed the judges and secured them the bronze award for Best Use of Content Marketing at MARKETING-INTERACTIVE’s Loyalty & Engagement Awards 2021.

Challenges 

Male grooming has been gaining popularity worldwide, with the value of the men’s skincare sector in Singapore experiencing upward growth since 2010, according to figures by market research company Euromonitor International. In spite of this, GATSBY realised that Asia had been lagging behind the rest of the world and was only just beginning to catch up, thus the use of male grooming products in Singapore was still largely confined to basics such as face washes, face moisturisers, pomades, toothbrushes, and pimple patches.

Keen on tapping into the burgeoning male grooming market in Asia, GATSBY wanted to promote its range of men’s facial wipes, increasing awareness of the product and subsequently adoption among young male working adults and young male students. With the aforementioned context in mind, GATSBY’s challenge was in transforming its facial wipes from something Singapore’s men had never shown interest in, into a daily essential.

To that end, GATSBY wanted to create a campaign that would increase daily usage of its facial wipes and acquiresign-ups for samples of the facial wipes. The campaign would also be targeted towards young male working adults and young male students.

Strategy 

To address its challenge, GATSBY came up with #10SecSwag, a campaign designed to provide a brand-new proposition to the grooming world — one so compelling that men would have no choice but to start swiping their way to swag. As a key barrier to the campaign was a lack of familiarity with GATSBY’s facial wipes, its strategy for the campaign revolved around three key anchors - creating an irresistible value proposition through the #10SecSwag idea, giving audiences compelling reasons to try the wipes for themselves, and leveraging on influencer marketing.

To induce interest in GATSBY’s facial wipes, it needed to establish its value in a saturated field of grooming products. This was achieved through #10SecSwag, the idea of an unprecedented product that could help consumers look their best in just 10 seconds. Apart from conveying this unique proposition, GATSBY also selected the theme of swag as a young, novel way of presenting the idea of looking good; one that would resonate with our key audience.

As GATSBY’s target audience had largely never used its facial wipes before, it felt that was imperative to put the product in consumers’ hands and let them experience the wipes for themselves. In doing so, the brand hoped that it would see value in the product and consequently be open to adopting the facial wipes on a daily basis. 

According to Instagram, 87% of people claim that influencers have driven them to make purchases. Coupled with the fact that Facebook and Instagram are platforms with a predominantly younger audience that falls within GATSBY’s desired demographic, utilising influencer marketing across those platforms was a natural fit for the brand’s goals

Additionally, the immediate access to each influencer’s fanbase meant that GATSBY could reach out to a large number of new audiences, a key consideration in a campaign where product awareness was paramount to success. At the same time, tapping on a pool of influencers across different fields of interest would allow GATSBY to isolate audience segments that could be effectively targeted with these interests in mind. The use of influencers would also allow the brand to create an organic conversation around its facial wipes; one that would enhance credibility with its younger audience by demonstrating real people using the wipes in real-life scenarios.

Execution 

To reach out to its younger target audience, GATSBY sought out a quirky, energetic look and feel that would convey the theme of swag while staying true to its brand voice. The brand also carried out the bulk of its communications on digital and social media channels, in order to best connect with this contemporary generation of digital natives.

GATSBY worked with TMRW to create a campaign microsite where users could learn about its facial wipes and sign up to receive free samples via mail. As part of a campaign refresh, the microsite was later updated to feature user reviews through a “League of Swag” section.

GATSBY also commissioned influencers to create posts on social media; including static posts, video posts, and Instagram Stories. These were posted in three separate phases and were split up along three content angles — working from home, active lifestyles, and the last aimed specifically at driving sales of the facial wipes. Additionally, two separate sets of digital banners were created and delivered through the Google Display Network, in order to better target both segments of the key audience

At the same time, GATSBY carried out a campaign giveaway from 29 July to 10 September 2020 on its Facebook and Instagram pages. In order to win Swag Packs worth $50, participants had to submit photos of them using GATSBY’s facial wipes and tag the photos with the campaign hashtag, #10SecSwag. This served as an additional source of engagement and sample sign-ups

Lastly, GATSBY used multiple deliverables to educate audiences about various aspects of its facial wipes; including available product variants, the benefits of each variant, and how to use the wipes. On top of regular social media content, GATSBY also used Instagram three-grids to provide eye-catching visual variety. A printed cheat sheet was also included with each sample pack of GATSBY facial wipes, demonstrating how to use the wipes in a simple three-step process - cleanse, smooth, refresh.

Results

The campaign saw over 14 million impressions across Facebook, Instagram and the Google Display Network, 68,000 link clicks and engagements, and 52,000 microsite landing page views. It also saw and average of 4,100 static post engagements, 728 video engagements and 3,558 story engagements from Instagram influencer content. GATSBY also achieved its objectives, with a 19% increase in sell-through volume, and over 18,000 sign-ups for its facial wipes samples - 20% more than its campaign goal.