A small nation on the outskirts of the planet, the world is by and large indifferent to Norway. When the country once in a blue moon makes international news, the context is usually positive - like the UNs happiness report, the Winter Olympics or our scenic nature. It doesn't happen very often, and that is why international news about Norway usually gets a lot of national press. How would Norwegian media react if international news ran a story about something Norwegians had no reason to be proud of? Like our skyrocketing rates of chlamydia cases?
Background
Situation:
Open 24-hours a day, 7-Eleven is where Norwegians typically get contraceptives when the need more or less spontaneously occurs. Unfortunately, too many of them don't.
Brief:
Remind Norwegians that 7-Eleven has condoms, preferably in a way that is hard to ignore.
Objective:
Make 7-Eleven know as the go-to place for condoms.
Describe the creative idea
Universal healthcare. A full year of paid maternity leave. Spectacular nature. Being Norwegian, there are many things to be proud of. Unfortunately, using condoms is not one of them. In fact, Norway has one of the highest rates of chlamydia in Europe. Most Norwegians are not aware of this.
Our idea was to build a campaign on this piece of highly shameful information, by informing Norwegians that even though Norway is the land of the fjords and the midnight sun, it is also the land of chlamydia.
Describe the strategy
This campaign was based on advertising pretending to target foreign tourists in Norway. The real target group was obviously Norwegians who neglect to protect themselves when having sex.
A Facebook-film and 125 billboards in visitor-dense areas in Oslo welcomed tourists to Norway - by encouraging them to protect themselves against the locals with condoms from 7-Eleven.
Know how much Norwegian press loves stories about Norway in international press, our strategy was to create a campaign that would be hard to ignore - and even harder not to share in social media. The press caught on even before tourists started to share the billboards, but the whole thing really blow up when the online-film was featured on John Olivers Last week Tonight. This is wasn't only a big deal for 7-Eleven, but also for our national press, who made sure the campaign got even more unpaid PR.
Describe the execution
The campaign lasted one week, and consisted of an online-film on 7-Elevens own Facebook and more than 125 boards strategically placed at the Oslo airport, the main train stations and other places heavily visited by tourists.
List the results
With a budget of only 70 000 NOK (roughly 7383 Euros) the campaign reached 1,57 million people - or roughly 40% of the population in Norway, with a brand linkage of almost 65%.
The campaign became a reference point in a national debate about why so many Norwegians neglect to protect themselves, where representatives from various health organizations applauded 7-Eleven for addressing an important sexual health issue in a commercial campaign.