Mars Wrigley finds the perfect audience for its new product with panda ads

Eclipse mints are made by Mars Wrigley, the world’s leading manufacturer of chocolate, chewing gum, mints and fruity confections. When it came to launching a fresh new product in the range in Hong Kong, they knew they needed a fresh and creative solution. That’s where panda ads came in to serve up the right mix of audience targeting and creative media to get consumers buying.

A tasty challenge

In a competitive FMCG market like Hong Kong, breaking through and acquiring new customers is a challenging task. Mars Wrigley needed an innovative new way to reach audiences with a high-impact launch, while also being able to better measure campaign effectiveness. A refreshing approach was needed to ensure the new Eclipse product made an impact.

The new product, Eclipse’s soothing mints with herbal ingredients that target light throat-care occasions, was a new proposition for the market. To deliver this unique product proposition, we devised a creative media rollout strategy, employed across a distinctive mix of channels.

A fresh approach

panda ads brought a fresh perspective to the challenge, pulling together a multi-channel approach that utilised retail media solutions alongside offline activations to connect with foodpanda’s customer base. This strategy was chosen to maximise reach and engagement across multiple touchpoints and bring consumers through the purchase journey.

To help shift the minds of consumers towards considering Eclipse mints in a new category, we needed an educational approach. Shoppers on foodpanda were served visually engaging video ads, a new premium format at the time, that introduced the new proposition while they tracked the status of their recent order.

By reaching engaged shoppers, already searching for food and groceries, the ads could take them straight to pandamart to purchase and enjoy their cooling Eclipse mints.

Another tactic deployed was pairing the targeting with moments where people were more likely to enjoy the new Eclipse products. We partnered with a fried chicken restaurant chain to capture those browsing and buying, with messages delivered throughout the customer journey. This meant we found the people most in need of an after-meal mint to soothe their throats.

Stimulating trying and buying

Sampling is a great way to accelerate a product launch, so we promoted free samples via push notifications, pandamart carousel banner, and in-app pop ups. We also utilised foodpanda’s q-commerce excellence to activate offline channels to get the products into consumers’ hands.

Tracking the distribution of samples can be a difficult task. That’s why a trackable QR code was added on the distributed leaflets that instantly let consumers purchase the new Eclipse mints on pandamart to close the loop from offline-to-online.

Here’s a snapshot of the customer and order journey that we brought together:

The results? As cool as the mints

The innovative approach translated into strong results for Eclipse’s new flavour launch in Hong Kong. Firstly, shoppers on the app were engaged and consuming the content, with 43% completing the video ad.

When it came to stimulating trials, over 40,000 samples were distributed in collaboration with the 13 partnered restaurants, giving consumers a taste of the product that led to a lasting impact.

Most important of all, these impacts translated into tangible results. Within just 3 months of the launch of the new product on pandamart, the new Eclipse flavours reached 72% of the sales of the original best-selling flavour offering. Tasty results for the Mars Wrigley team that showcase the potential of retail media and panda ads solutions.