Campaign Plidenta
Social responsibility and brand activism are increasingly important drivers when choosing a product, especially when it comes to a product like toothpaste which we usually use more than once a day. Consumers like to choose brands that have ideas and attitude.
The idea for the campaign came just before the 2017 Local Elections in Croatia. Shortly before the elections, there was a great deal of turmoil in the political arena, with coalitions forming and dissolving just as often as governments were. The media, as well as the consumer, landscape was saturated with political messages, platitudes, and promises, and our goal was to bring those same political promises to life in an intelligent and humorous way.
The idea was to use pre-election hype in the teaser phase with provocative messages without dental context with terms that have one meaning in dentistry and oral hygiene (e.g., bridge (most) is a type of fixed dental prosthesis, gums (desni) are gums, fountain (fontana) is a spittoon, crown (krunica) is a type of fixed dental prosthesis), and other meanings in everyday life (e.g. “Most” is the name of a political party in Croatia, desni (“right”, as in “right-wing”) in politics represents a more conservative political orientation, krunica (“rosary beads”) are used for prayer, and the construction of fountains was a major political promise of the mayor of Zagreb).
The creative and media strategy followed the standard communication channels of political parties featured in the campaign, such as billboards, digital citylights, web banners and social networks. The campaign was divided into two phases – a teaser and a reveal phase. The teaser phase was meant to make waves with provocative messages, while the reveal phase, by revealing the dental context on the day of pre-election silence, contributed to an a-ha moment and uncovered the humorous character of the campaign, which consumers recognised and rewarded with increased consumption and excellent results.
During the campaign, there was a 55% increase in sales of Plidenta Healthcare toothpaste compared to the previous year and a 17% increase in sales of the entire Plidenta range. The data refer to unit sales of toothpaste in the period between May and July 2017 compared to the same period in 2016.
