The mobile component of a cross channel Unilever campaign for its Lynx brand generated 149 million impressions while also driving efficiency and engagement.

Unilever partnered with AdMob for the mobile component of a campaign around the launch of its new Lynx Excite product in the United Kingdom that ran during the first quarter of 2011. From the beginning, the focus was on developing a TV ad that would work in mobile and across other touchpoints.

"The campaign showcases what is possible with HTML5 and also bridges a campaign across platforms," said Nic Cumisky, senior industry manager at Google.

 "Mobile sites provide users with opportunities for excellent engagement and interaction - the carousel (representing the angels halo to extend the 'Angels' theme) was an superb demonstration that touch screen interaction captures and maintains a users engagement, steering them onward throughout the content," he said.

"This married with the ability to understand what the user once on site was engaging with allowed the production team behind the site to optimise site layout to ensure that the most engaging elements of the site were most visible."

Falling angels
While the idea of integrating creative across consumer touchpoints to create a consistent message is not new, marketers are increasingly include mobile among those touchpoints.

Mobile enables marketers to personalize the integrated content to a particular individual.

?Unilever is willing to experiment with multiple techniques in mobile and that?s a good thing from an experience point of view,? said Neil Strother, Kirkland, WA-based mobile practice director at ABI Research.

?To see a CPG-type brand be as aggressive as they are is a positive sign. They are right there with the leaders pushing a digital, mobile angle,? he said.

Mr. Stother is not affiliated with Unilever or AdMob, which is part of Google. He commented based on his expertise in the mobile advertising space. 

The idea behind the campaign is that the new Lynx Excite fragrance is so powerful it makes angels fall from the sky.

Mobile phone users who clicked on the mobile banner ads were taken to an expanded ad experience where they see a halo.

The halo enabled navigation through the microsite, allowing users to see the TV ad, behind the scenes footage not available anywhere else and interactive features such as tips, tricks and tools.

Unilever built an HTML5 mobile landing page for the campaign in order to provide an engaging experience for mobile users.

Unilever used AdMob to see if it could provide greater reach and efficiency of cost. It also wanted to see if there was a higher engagement level with Android users.

?By integrating, presumably they are being more efficient,? Mr. Strother said. ?They are spreading their costs across multiple channels ? that is really smart.?

Using AdMob gave Unilever the ability to target iOS and Android platforms.

?I think more and more companies are realizing in the last year and a half as the Android market size has increased that it?s a smart move to test campaigns for Android,? Mr. Strother said.

?It?s not just all about iPhones anymore and looking beyond just one OS platform makes a ton of sense especially for a brand that has broad appeal like Unilever.?

The campaign delivered 149 million impressions and 690,000 unique visitors. In addition, users across all devices spend approximately two minutes engaging with the brand.

?Those are good metrics,? Mr.Strother said. ?The question is were they doing this for branding purposes or to push more products. How good it performed really depends on what they are measuring.?

Final Take
Chantal Tode, Assoc. Editor, Mobile Marketer