Postfuture Entries for DFW IMA EIMA
awards
Category: Most Effective Use of
Online Creative
Title: ABC Dinotopia
Megaseries Premier:
http://postfuture.com/dinotopia
Description:
ABC engaged
Postfuture to create an animated 3D character named "Zippo" who
starred in the TV mega-series Dinotopia premiering in
May 2002, then email and track it with a 30-second movie trailer
to 694,000 Disney email subscribers.
Goals:
The goal was
to drive viewership of the TV series and encourage
click-thru to the Hallmark sponsored website www.dinotopia.com.
Implementation:
Postfuture
used video test footage and voice actor dialogue to develop and animate a
3D model of Zippo. Since the character was a central character of the series, a
great deal of attention was given to model accuracy, animation
gestures & timing, skin texture & color, and overall
emotional appeal. Postfuture used a proprietary method for isolating and
rendering individual components of the character, such as neck, head, eyes
& arms, as independent layers for rapid download and high quality playback
synchronous with streaming audio as a Flash HTML insert.
In
addition, Postfuture utilized proprietary methods for preparing the Dinotopia video trailer as Flash-based "simulated
video" that would stream reliably at dialup speeds. Further, the
company applied specialized technologies for delivering an auto-scaling email
message, ranging from plain text, rich-text, HTML and Flash animation,
based on the capabilities of each recipient's email reader. Those who
could not see the animation could click to view in their browser. The email
message also featured a Send-to-a-Friend feature so recipients could share the
unusual message with others.
Results:
Of messages
delivered, the view rate was 31% with 24,432 clicks to dinotopia.com and
2,724 pass-alongs to new people. This was considered
a very successful online promotion by ABC primetime marketers and, in
combination with other promotions, resulted in a very high viewership
rating.
Category: Most Effective Viral
Marketing Program
Title: Pizza Hut Mix-it-up:
http://postfuture.com/P/hr.asp?r=80&e=9595416
Description:
Postfuture was engaged by Brann Forbes on behalf of their client Pizza Hut (now a direct client of Postfuture) to develop a viral marketing campaign. The email message, named "Mix-it-Up", was a multimedia Flash-based message that enabled each Pizza Hut opt-in member to audition 24 different tracks of musical samples, organized into lead, rhythm, bass and drums, select up to 4 selections, listen to the resulting musical mix -- then, forward it to a friend. This was all performed inside the email itself if the recipient's email reader was Flash capable.
When the recipient opened the email, they immediately heard the specific musical mix sent by their friends while being presented with Pizza Hut coupons that could be printed. The recipient could then create their own musical mix and send it to their friends. Anyone could opt-in to the Pizza Hut list, if not already subscribed.
The campaign consisted of both an initial email broadcast and was hosted as an integrated part of the Pizza Hut website for 3 months after the initial campaign.
Goals:
The Mix-it-Up campaign was very successful in driving referrals to friends and prints/ redemptions of Pizza Hut coupons.
Implementation:
Based on an initial concept layout by Brann Forbes and approved by Pizza Hut, Postfuture managed all aspects of the audio production, Flash implementation, message creation, email distribution, viral pass-along functionality, print-at-home coupon handling, list management and response tracking.
Postfuture staff selected all audio clips to be used, each fully loopable and mixable at the correct audio levels with any combination of selections. The most difficult part of the Flash implementation was to ensure that the recipient could begin interacting with the piece within 10 seconds of opening the email while the content-rich audio and imagery streamed in -- even at dialup modem speeds. Each musical selection was identified as a parameter and stored with each recipient's profile so that the personalized musical mix could be reconstructed automatically when opened by a forwarded recipient.
The message was sent and tracked to several different Pizza Hut opt-in email lists, together comprising approximately 850,000 subscribers.
Results:
In the initial email campaign, the view rate was 33% opened with 84% Flash views of emails received. Of delivered, the click rate was an amazing 82.6%. Approximately 2,600 personalized musical email mixes were passed along to friend with nearly 25,000 coupons printed! Over 87,000 different musical compositions were created during this one email campaign, demonstrating the degree of enjoyment by the audience and time spent within the Pizza Hut brand.
In addition to the email campaign, Mix-it-Up was placed on the Pizza Hut web site for visitors to play with and send to their friends. During the 3 month period, over 32,000 people enjoyed the interactive piece, resulting in an aggregate 316,000 total clicks, 49,000 compositions created and nearly 2,700 friends receiving the Mix-it-Up campaign. This campaign remains the most successful viral marketing campaign to date for Pizza Hut.
Most Effective E-mail Campaign (B2B)
Microsoft TS/2 Geo-targeted
Announcements:
http://postfuture.com/P/hr.asp?r=80&e=CB59D522-CDFD-4D03-9CA5-E819B44E0DBC
Description:
Postfuture
was engaged by the seminar group at Microsoft (located in
Goals:
The primary goal was to drive seminar attendance. To do this, the announcement needed to rapidly communicate the seminar date/time, location and venue and feature a primary call-to-action to register for the local seminar. To maximize interest, a registration and attendence would enter the recipient to win a free XBox game system. As a reminder, the announcement needed to be timed to deploy twice, each a specific number of days prior to the seminar. In addition, the announcement needed to secondarily identify each recipient's type of business (Integrator, Developer or System Builder) and provide a feedback survey to learn what would be of greatest interest to each audience and why they might not want to attend.
Implementation:
The strategy, design, implementation and deployment was created entirely by Postfuture. The design integrated all of Microsoft's goals into a single message. Postfuture created a customized automated messaging system based on the company's proprietary messaging system that would automatically send messages to Microsoft partners in each of the different seminar cities every day based on a pre-determined schedule. Each message was dynamically personalized with the correct city for the recipient. Each recipient could click to register, select their area of greatest interest, pass the message to someone else in their organization or quickly answer the question as to why they would not be attending. The message also included an animated Flash introduction with music to help enhance open and response rates.
Results:
During the month of June 2002, the message open rates were exceptional at 61% of delivered with clicks to the seminar registration page over 3.5% of emails delivered. It was learned that approximately 1/3rd of the audience viewed the Flash insert and that the audience was fairly evenly divided between areas of interest, though Integrators were most numerous in the audience at 39% of total. Also, the primary reason given for not attending the seminar was the date was not convenient or had prior commitments. One survey question revealed that nearly 60% of the audience believed that the seminar was of "High" value. This program continued over a period of 9 months with a continuous level of success.
Most Effective Email Campaign (B2C)
Gadzooks Campaign:
http://postfuture.com/P/hr.asp?r=80&e=15258563
Description:
Gadzooks engaged Postfuture to develop a B2C promotional email marketing program designed to motivate their opt-in customers (14-24) to visit the store more often while building valuable psychographic profiles to help the company keep pace with trends and anticipate purchase preferences. The message designs needed to communicate the excitement and fun associated with the Gadzooks brand in a way that would appeal to their audience demographic.
Goals:
Primary call-to-action was to print a coupon for redemption in a local Gadzooks store. Postfuture utilized its proprietary print-at-home coupon technology to deliver and track the coupons printed from the email message. In addition, a preference survey was embedded to enable recipients to express their preferences in clothing stores, music and fashion in order to plan future campaigns and online/offline promotions.
Implementation:
Postfuture
provided an end-to-end solution for Gadzooks, including touchpoint
strategy, design, implementation, campaign management, message distribution and
response tracking. The initial message was sent and tracked to 5 different
different geo-targeted regions in order to gauge
differences between different parts of the
Results:
This campaign exhibited open rates of nearly 35% with a click rate of 26.33% of emails delivered - a rate over 3 times the normal industry rate of 8%. The coupon print rate was an impressive 6.88% of total messages delivered with a respectable number of messages forwarded to friends, considering the lack of a specific incentive offer. Postfuture has continued to send similar promotions to Gadzooks opt-in customers over the past year.
Most Effective Customer Retention
Promotion
McAfee Upgrade for Blockbuster
Coupon:
http://postfuture.com/P/hr.asp?r=80&e=03E0B825-3654-4031-9BA2-7CB5B1477B02
Description:
McAfee.com,
part of Network Associates, engaged Postfuture and Blockbuster to develop
an online incentive program to McAfee customers to help increase
re-subscription rates for McAfee virus protection software. This program would
deliver Free Blockbuster Movie rental coupons to any McAfee customer who signed
up for another year of McAfee service.
Goals:
The primary
and only goal was to increase sales by automatically delivering Blockbuster
coupons via email, thereby minimizing fulfillment costs and maximizing ROI to
McAfee.
Implementation:
Postfuture
partnered with Blockbuster to integrate Postfuture's secure
print-at-home coupon technology with Blockbuster's barcodes tied to their POS
system. Postfuture modified it's digital coupon system
to accept Blockbuster supplied coupon barcodes and dynamically assign and
generate codes to each authorized McAfee customer. Each week, McAfee supplies
one or more email lists of recipients that Postfuture uses to distribute
Blockbuster coupons to - each secured for one print. Coupons incorporate
proprietary and patent-pending fraud prevention technology
ensure that coupons may not be screen captured, utilized by other people
or posted on websites.
Results:
Over a
5-month period, approximately 60% of the McAfee.com customers who received the
Free Movie Rental Coupons printed them. Through the course of the coupon
promotion, sales of license renewals increased 135% over prior incentive
promotions. The program, launched in February 2002, has been such a success for
McAfee.com that they continue it weekly through Postfuture today. In addition,
Postfuture continues to partner with Blockbuster to provide similar incentive
programs to both Blockbuster partners and Postfuture clients.