Why is this work relevant for Brand Experience & Activation ?
The Lost Typography of Bauhaus is a campaign that builds Adobe’s brand by putting lost pieces of art history in the hands of a new generation of designers, encouraging them to keep the legacy alive through digital activations and creativity. A world-first and brand exclusive initiative to engage the target audience creative professionals.
The main campaign KPI was to drive active use and get our audience to interact with the brand (Adobe Typekit) – a KPI that was more than successfully met.
Background
Adobe Typekit is a online service which offers a subscription library of high-quality fonts. The service is integrated in all Adobe Creative Cloud apps, such as Photoshop, Indesign and Illustrator.
In summer 2018 Adobe wanted to inspire a new generation of creatives to design using typography. A campaign with the aim to increase the usage of Adobe Typekit amongst creative professionals and enhance Adobe’s brand vision of ’thought leadership in creativity’.
Describe the creative idea
In the 1920s and 1930s the iconic design institute Bauhaus laid the foundation for modern design. Unfortunately the school’s existence was brief. The progressive ideas of Bauhaus were considered threatening to the Nazi agenda and in 1932 the school was abruptly shut down, only 14 years after its birth. The forced closure of the school resulted in a vast number of artworks and creative treasures never being completed, and what could’ve been design classics were left behind – lost to history.
In collaboration with the Bauhaus foundation and a team of typographers led by legendary type designer Erik Spiekermann we turned sparse typographical sketches from the Bauhaus archives into five complete typefaces and made them available in Adobe Typekit. Giving what was initiated by the Bauhaus masters almost a century ago new life in the hands of a new generation of designers.
Describe the strategy
User data from Adobe Creative Cloud showed that the trial rate of Adobe Typekit, amongst potential customers and existing Creative Cloud customers, was low in comparison to other products.
To get our target audience, creative professionals, to favor our service and fonts over the competition we needed to create something truly unique and engaging – beyond the technology and software.
Our solution was to provide the professional creative community with unique assets, restored from the iconic design institute Bauhaus exclusively in Adobe Typekit. To increase brand affinity we targeted our audience with a multi-channel strategy, activating and inspiring them to experience the power and creativity built in to Typekit and the Adobe brand.
Describe the execution
The unique typefaces were made available for download in Adobe Typekit, free for all Adobe Creative Cloud- and Typekit users. In an integrated online campaign, spanning from June 15 – August 31, 2018, the typefaces and the story about the project were spread globally through PR, social media and Adobe’s own channels (Youtube, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter)
To activate our target audience to create with the unique fonts we initiated a series of five design competitions on Instagram and Behance, with the challenge to design in Adobe’s apps using the fonts and Adobe Typekit. Further, we inspired our audience with design influencer collaborations, online typography seminars on Facebook, live typography events, a campaign video, Youtube typography tutorials and a documentary which in depth told about the project, the history of Bauhaus and the importance of typography.
List the results
Primary KPI
Target: 10 000 font downloads.
Result: 407 000 font downloads. Exceeding target by 3970%.
Secondary KPI:s
Target: 500 competition submissions
Result: over 2000 competition submissions . Exceeding target by 305%.
Target: 25 articles in relevant target media.
Result: 162 articles in relevant target media. Exceeding target by 548%.
(Gross reach estimation of the articles exceeds 800 million potential impressions. The overall sentiment was positive, with most articles mentioning the launch of fonts and the call-to-action on how to download them.)
Additional Results
15 600 organic social posts generating 147 million potential impressions
1.3 million social media engagements (likes & comments)
297 000 unique visitors on campaign site