Rice is nice: Sydney Fialkow of Atlanta (with family members) presents her winning Ben’s Beginners Cooking Contest dish.The kitchen is often thought of as the heart of the home. It’s also a foundation for bringing up healthy kids. Consider that children who have regular meals with their parents do better in most every social index: they are 42% less likely to drink, 50% less likely to smoke cigarettes and 66% less likely to smoke marijuana, according to a study conducted by National Center on Addiction and Drug Abuse at Columbia University. Regular family dinners also protect children from eating disorders and reduce childhood obesity.
These are encouraging statistics, no doubt, except that most kids don’t know their way around the kitchen: 65% of kids don’t know even how to boil an egg, says a Mars Food study.
That’s why Uncle Ben’s and agency partner Porter Novelli beginning in January 2012 sought to inspire American families to make healthier choices. Starting with a single grain of rice, the team wanted to place Uncle Ben’s at the center of family cooking experiences that, in turn, can lead to better meals, more diverse cuisines and more family time.
The multifaceted, six-month-long campaign based around the Uncle Ben’s brand had a single mission: to get kids to learn how to cook.
“It’s a problem that while nearly a third of children are considered overweight, most kids don’t know how to cook an egg,” says Tim Snyder, VP of marketing at Mars Food US, Uncle Ben’s parent. “We felt we could be an integral part in changing that.”
To drive that change the PR team, which consisted of six pros from Uncle Ben’s and six execs from Porter Novelli, created the Ben’s Beginners Cooking Contest, a Facebook-driven nationwide contest challenging parents to cook a kid- friendly recipe with their children.
In an integrated agency approach, Porter Novelli worked to achieve three primary objectives for the contest:
1. Drive entries and new “likes” to the Uncle Ben’s Facebook page among the target audience: primarily women, with children between the ages of five and 12.
2. Leverage earned media to increase awareness of the Uncle Ben’s brand online and within schools and communities across the United States.
3. Increase purchase intent of Uncle Ben’s rice through engagement and sharing on the Facebook page.
THREE-PHASE APPROACH
While it’s true that just getting the family together at the dinner table is beneficial to children, the team tried to teach kids the lifelong skill of cooking, not just have them enjoy a meal for a day.
A study published in the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine found that frequency of preparing food was related to lower intakes of fat and higher intakes of fruit and vegetables, fiber, folate (vitamin B) and vitamin A. The study also found that frequently preparing your own foods was related to lower intakes of carbonated beverages among females and lower intakes of fried foods among males.
The strategy included a three-phased approach comprised of both traditional and digital elements:
▶ Phase 1: Generate Buzz. The team used Facebook to interact with existing fans, secure new fans and encourage them to take part in the competition.
Facebook represented a new area of growth and an untapped consumer engagement channel for Uncle Ben’s.
“As the idea was being created, we knew that we had to put the brand in the hands of the consumer,” Snyder says. “We explored different media to do that. We had not been on Facebook as a brand ourselves, but it was the perfect hub for this type of campaign.”
To enter the contest, families were asked to submit a video on the Uncle Ben’s Facebook page for a chance to win $20,000.
At the same time, families were encouraged to get their schools involved as well, offering the winning family’s school a $50,000 cafeteria makeover.
The contest videos would show parents cooking a “kid-friendly rice dish” with their children, and in the clips the children would introduce the dishes and discuss the experience of making them as a family. Entrants would encouraged family and friends to vote for the best dish on Facebook.
Porter Novelli and the Uncle Ben’s brand signed actress Angie Harmon as a celebrity spokesperson and leveraged online relationships with top-tier mom bloggers to maximize exposure for the contest. What’s more, “The Rachel Ray Show” was added as a media partner.
▶ Phase 2: Drive Votes and Maximize Participation. The Uncle Ben’s Facebook page became a lively source of engagement with contestants. “The contest was all about engagement,” says Martin Pierce, senior VP at Porter Novelli. “Facebook is a great tool for sparking dialogue.”
A PR toolkit was created to help contestants generate news and excitement within their communities and schools.Porter Novelli gave contestants various materials to launch their own awareness-raising campaigns, providing them with press release templates and tips for contacting local morning show-producers and school assemblies.
CREATING A MOVEMENT
One objective of the campaign was to let consumers be part of the program without being spoken to or spoken at, Pierce says. “We realized early on that there were individuals who were so buzzed by this contest that they were going out there themselves and doing PR for us. That’s a goldmine.”
Starting on Feb. 27, 2012, a panel of judges reviewed more that 700 submitted videos; on March 26, four finalist clips appeared on the Facebook fan page. Consumers were asked to vote for their favorite. Then, closing out the second phase, these top four finalists were brought to New York to appear on “The Rachael Ray Show.”
▶ Phase 3: Announce the Winner. The Uncle Ben’s/ Porter Novelli team accompanied the final four parent/child teams on their trip to New York for the show, and gave each finalist a video camera to capture their own New York City moments.
Porter Novelli packaged the footage and video clips into a highlights reel for each finalist and shared these on the contest Facebook page.
The contest culminated in the announcement of the grand-prize winner live on “Rachel Ray,” featuring an assembly at the winner’s school. Local and national media were invited to the assembly, and the announcement was made via a screen projecting “The Rachael Ray Show.”
A photographer and videographer captured students’ reactions when they found out their school had won the $50,000 cafeteria makeover and quickly packaged the scenes for Facebook.
The team also created a multimedia press release with video, photos, quotes and the winning recipe. The team then leveraged the winner’s enthusiasm for Uncle Ben’s to reinforce key messages targeting local and national broadcast media.
MARKETING ROI
As head of marketing, Snyder says he was constantly focusing on the contest’s ROI, driving purchase intent, penetration and market share. And did it ever—the campaign achieved the following results:
• More than 700 videos were submitted through the Facebook application and nearly 60,000 votes were cast. During the course of the contest, Uncle Ben’s Facebook page “likes” rose 84%, to 138,000.
• The contest lifted brand perceptions of the Uncle Ben’s family-oriented attributes and boosted Uncle Ben’s purchase intent.
• More than 847 million media impressions were generated as part of the PR campaign, including placements secured by Ben’s Beginners Cooking Contest entrants. Notable placements include About.com, Huffington Post TV, MSNBC.com, Self and USA Today.
• More than 700 students, parents, teachers and community members attended the grand-prize event and viewing party at the winner’s school in Atlanta. Media attended from the local print and broadcast stations, including the local Fox and NBC affiliate stations, as well as the national Fox Network.
• The following day, the grand-prize winner’s child appeared on her local NBC affiliate morning show, and did an interview during the noon hour on CNN Headline News Now. Resulting coverage from the event totaled more than 38 million impressions and received more than 50 media placements.
KEEPING THE MOMENTUM
“Maintaining relationships with consumers is paramount—immediately after the contest ended, we sent out thank you notes,” says Snyder. “We continue to highlight people who have been a part of the program on Facebook.”
SEASONAL CHANGE
For 2013, the campaign’s timing is changing from launching in the health season to back to school in the fall. “When back to school kicks in, the dinner dilemma kicks in,” says Snyder. “That timing alone should help improve the next campaign.”
That, and taking the contest to other countries where Uncle Ben’s is sold, like Ireland and the U.K., should also help spread the movement. PRN
CONTACT:
Martin.Pearce, [email protected]; Sydney Siegmuth, [email protected].
4 Winning Facebook Contest Tips
By Sydney Siegmuth, account supervisor, Porter Novelli
The Ben’s Beginners Cooking Contest helped address the real issue of teaching kids how to make healthier choices in the kitchen and involved sumptious prizes ($20,000 and a $50,000 school-cafeteria makeover) as well as an appearance on “The Rachel Ray Show.” This led to a large number of entries from a passionate group of community members, which helped lead the campaign to success. Here’s what we learned during the process:
• Be engaged with your fans. Throughout the entirety of the contest, make yourself available to answer questions during the submission process. If things go awry, they’ll be a lot more forgiving if you’ve been engaged and genuine with them from the get-go.
• Be willing to let go and give up some control. Let your fans have fun with the contest and allow them to share their experiences (in their own words) across their social networks.
• Make it easy for people to share the contest with their friends and community. Give them a reason to keep coming back.
• Help keep the momentum going after the contest. Offer your fans a place to share stories and talk about their experience with the brand.
Source: Porter Novelli
Contest Brings Uncle Ben’s Share, Engagement To a Nice Boil
The Ben’s Beginners Cooking Contest on Facebook caused significant spikes in market share and social engagement, generating more than 500 million impressions.