Published by isobel.regan@dontpanicprojects.com
Published Date 20.07.2023 
Shortlisted for:
Best Use of Paid Social – Extreme x Henry
Best Integrated Campaign – Extreme x Henry
Best Use of TikTok – Extreme x Alcotraz
Best Use of Paid Social – Extreme x Alcotraz
Who we are:
Extreme is a multi-award winning agency based in the heart of Yorkshire. Founded in 2002 with an initial focus on the brochure sites popular at that time, the team has grown and weathered the storms of recessions, pandemics and the digital revolution, to become a full-service agency with an offering that includes social media, SEO, and content, through to web development, design and brand strategy.
We’re really excited to have not one, but four shortlisted entries in this year’s UK Social Media Awards, recognising our work with Numatic International on the launch of the ‘Henry Quick’ stick vacuum and how we leveraged paid social and TikTok to smash targets for Alcotraz, a unique and immersive cocktail experience.
What we did:
Extreme x Henry
We were delighted to be tasked with launching Henry Quick, the latest exciting addition to the iconic range of Henry vacuum cleaners, produced by Numatic International — and Henry’s hotly-anticipated first foray into the world of cordless stick vacuums.
Our aim was to create, implement and manage a PPC and paid social strategy to meet consumer sales targets during the 12-week campaign period. As part of this we were tasked with helping MyHenry to achieve a target number of Henry Quick sales across all channels.
Our strategy was to grab attention by starting with the issue inherent to stick vacs — messy emptying — and through strong creative implementation, position Henry Quick as the solution.
We produced strong native (and interactive i.e. programmatic) creative, working alongside Henry’s hero videos, as well as opting for short-form video, supported by single-message static content. In addition, we created high-performing assets (static, video and GIF) throughout, including integrated influencer content. This was adapted to fit seasonal themes and highlighted the USP: dust-free emptying.
We stuck with two key straplines, ‘Say hello to Henry Quick’ and ‘No dust, no mess, no fuss’ to tap into audience frustrations with competitor products. We also shouted about customer reviews, industry accolades and influencer unboxings. We also tried things outside of business-as-usual activity. This included interactive display through Stackadapt, sequencing ads on YouTube, and the introduction of paid search activity on Microsoft.
We were over 489% over our campaign reach target, over 379% over campaign traffic targets, and the business saw a 95.58% increase in overall site revenue year on year from launch to the end of the year. This was a 33.8% increase in overall DTC sales for 2022.
Extreme x Alcotraz
The crime of the time? That not nearly enough people knew about Alcotraz’s immersive experience.
Whether a date night, hen do, birthday or team trip, the experience is as versatile as it is unique and the brand needed help getting inmates through the doors and into those cells.
We delivered both a paid and organic strategy to meet the team’s objectives, with incredible results. This commenced with a strategy and discovery session, audit of past activity and identification of core demographics.
One of the main challenges for the paid strategy was a limited budget in a highly competitive industry. With new immersive experiences popping up every week, especially in London, we had to contend with advertisers promoting nightlife, events and theatre.
How we overcame it: We conducted extensive split-testing and were ruthless with both our budget and creatives. We stayed at the forefront of best practices and trends for media buying on Meta, finding the perfect combination of technical and creative strategy. We tracked ticket sales daily, meaning we could see venue capacities and react immediately. We also created social-forward ad creatives. Many competitors use beautifully designed single-image ads which make it difficult to convey an immersive experience. We ensured that we produced a range of video creatives to appeal to all of our audiences. For this we worked with a selected group of influencers at each of Alcotraz’s locations and then we visited the venues to experience Alcotraz first-hand and create bespoke content, communicating the full experience authentically.
The results speak for themselves: We delivered impressive and consistent ROAS with a limited budget – £1.2k per month to cover four venues. This is supported by the fact that Alcotraz now appears in the “Top 10 things to do in…” for each of its city locations.
Our other strategy focused on harnessing TikTok under organic social. Our objectives were to boost bookings, increase social following and boost engagements. We did this in a few ways. From POV-style content to experience callouts, we pushed the brand guidelines to offer this new audience a different insight into the Alcotraz experience.
We called out key audience groups (e.g. this is your sign to send this to your boss) or locations (e.g. Come to Alcotraz in Brighton with us) with playful captions and hashtags.
And finally, we used content from inmates who had visited to ensure that whenever a prospective inmate was scrolling, they couldn’t escape.
We transformed a two-week old TikTok account with low engagement into one that continues to inspire users to book their sentences — achieving three viral videos (and over 5.5 million views) during a three-month period. TikTok followers increased by 22993% from 97 to 22.4k in 10 months. In eight weeks we achieved 25k comments, shares and saves, and in 10 months we achieved 42k comments, shares and saves. The TikTok videos we’ve produced are some of the best performing creatives in the Meta ads, with a ROAS of 18:1.
Donna Herron, Head of Social at Extreme said: “To be recognised in any category is wonderful, to have four submissions shortlisted in such prestigious awards is truly fantastic. Accreditation of this nature is always significant; to have external review and validation of the strength of these strategies is a great boost for the whole team and we’re excited to celebrate with other nominees at the event in September.”
