Inspiration for selling at Christmas
Six award-winning campaigns show different approaches and feelings a brand can appeal to.
We share six win-win campaigns to rethink the importance of Christmas advertising.
We are getting closer and closer to the season of the year in which the largest number of sales take place and in which consumers are most willing to ask for and buy quality, higher-priced products.
The Christmas season is so important commercially that whatever your brand is, the experts recommend devoting part of your efforts and your marketing strategy to it, so that you can get consumers to choose your products in these weeks.
To inspire you we share these Christmas campaigns that won at Cannes Lions , El Ojo de Iberoamérica and el Diente and that show different approaches and feelings that can be appealed to in order to reach consumers:
1- “Monty the Penguin” (2014)
The British retailer John Lewis and the agency Adam&Eve/DDB set the bar high for Christmas commercials. And none, perhaps, is more perfectly crafted than this campaign, which won the Film Craft Grand Prix at Cannes in 2015 (and the Creative Effectiveness Grand Prix in 2016). Its narration tells the charming story of a boy and his penguin friend, who seems sad when the holidays arrive because someone is missing at his side. With a cover of “Real Love” by John Lennon, it is a masterpiece of craft and storytelling, with a lovely twist at the end.
It works on tenderness, Christmas sensibility and the power of dreams.
2- “Sorry I spent it on myself’ (2013)
Christmas is about giving, sharing and caring. But not at Harvey Nichols, the UK’s leading luxury fashion retailer. There it is about me, me, me. To “help” their customers, together with the agency Adam&Eve/DDB they invented a new product line for the festive season. The gift collection “Sorry, I spent it on myself”.
Basically they worked on self-gratification, selfishness and created a range of price points so that people could spend less on others and more on themselves. Despite the criticism, the campaign’s success was high. The entire range, which reached 26,000 products, sold out in three days and the campaign helped Harvey Nichols to have one of its best Christmases.
3- Campaign “Justino” by the Lotería de España (2015)
The Christmas Lottery campaign and its tagline “El mayor premio es compartirlo” was a complete success in 2014, to the point of putting an end to several years of decline in the sales of this product. The 2015 campaign had to consolidate that achievement, developing the same concept but without falling into routine and creating surprise in the viewer.
The agency Leo Burnett created an animated short film that told the story of Justino, a night watchman who, because of his hours, had barely any contact with his daytime-shift colleagues and therefore could not share the lottery.
This ad was shared globally, it was viewed on social media but also in cinemas and it gave the brand, in addition to good economic figures, a good positive profile.
4- “Vuelo de Navidad” campaign, Latam (2017)
So that no child traveling on Christmas Eve would miss the magic of Christmas, Mccann and Latam made it possible for kids to see, through the plane window, Santa Claus crossing the sky with his reindeer-drawn sleigh. After the projection, the plane’s crew handed out gifts among the children, turning the flight into an unforgettable celebration.
5- “Cumple Navidad” campaign, Tarjeta Naranja (2018)
Christmas is the loveliest time of the year. Full of magic and wonderful moments. As long as you were not born on December 25. BBDO Argentina together with Tarjeta Naranja used this situation to move people and to raise the importance of this season for doing something good for someone else.
6- “Christmas Hero” campaign, Fire Service Plus México (2019)
In order to fight the frequent Christmas fires, Fire Service Plus México (FSPM) and Figallo No Format Agency developed Christmas Hero, a system that fights fire by itself and that has two elements, a star and a set of baubles that are activated in the presence of fire on the Christmas tree.
As you will notice, not all brands have the same audiences, so knowing yours will be one of the most relevant factors when thinking both about the message to communicate and the media. Of course the latter will also depend on the budget available, but undoubtedly in the digital era that will not be an impediment to Christmas creativity.
Argency’s little Christmas gem
The following video is one of our first audiovisual pieces. We made it for Rama Caída together with Oeste Films in 2008.
