Freeting
Senior Digital Strategist: Kate Wells
Agency: Day One
Client: Chipotle
Awards:
Shorty Finalist in Gamification
Shorty Award for Integration with Live Television, Twitter
Shorty Bronze Distinction in Contest or Promotion
Chipotle asked us to help them win the delivery wars. They intended to do this by offering free delivery during the NBA Finals to incentivize people to give it a try, but we had to make the offer known across the U.S as only one in every four Chipotle fans knew that Chipotle delivered.
However, the NBA Finals already had a category sponsor, so Chipotle couldn’t talk about the NBA Finals in any way, shape or form. No “big game,” no player names, no use of the participating team’s colors.
Since Chipotle couldn’t do the talking, it would let the announcers of the Finals games do the talking for them. Fans just had to tune in and log on to Twitter to play their own game with Chipotle.
The brilliantly simple game of #Freeting was born. Each time the announcers said free - Free Throw, Free Agent, etc - @chipotletweets would tweet a code for free burritos. The first 500 people to text Chipotle that code would get a free burrito.
The Results
When you’re locked out of a big event, there are two options. Either give up and move on, or take a risk. We helped Chipotle take a big risk by delivering an innovative campaign that used key insights about the target audience to tip the scales of success in our favor to deliver a successful campaign.
Delivery Orders During the Finals Spiked 100% at Chipotle, Year Over Year
2 Billion Earned Media Impressions, Including 450 Press Stories Mentioning Free Delivery During the The Finals
200k Unique Participants in Freeting Over the Course of the The Finals
The Average Freeting Contestant Tried His/Her Hand at Winning a Free Burrito More than Eight Times
Zero Dollars Spent on Sponsoring The Finals
The effort went viral and Mark Jackson, former NBA star and one of the game announcers, tweeted to his own followers about the promotion.