Costa Crociere
Costa boosted awareness and drove brand outcomes with an authentic, emotional campaign
The Objective
Ahead of the Sanremo Music Festival – Italy’s most popular song contest and award ceremony, Costa Crociere wanted to boost awareness and increase its engagement rate. The campaign aimed to build a consumer-centric and integrated communication campaign that could highlight the real emotions and unique moments you feel on-board Costa ships. This would be achieved by pushing their brand's payoff ‘believe your eyes’ in an authentic, organic and engaging way.
The Solution
The initial idea started from the assumption that a cruise with Costa goes far beyond a simple vacation, and when you've experienced something extraordinary, it's not easy to go back to normal. The creative answer to the brief was then born organically on TikTok, where Costa found their perfect match, ‘Little Leo’.
In the organic viral video, Little Leo can’t contain his emotions and his desire to get back on-board as soon as his Costa cruise is over. Costa believed this moment encapsulated the real magic that their cruises have to offer. From here, Little Leo became the protagonist of Costa’s omnichannel brand campaign, which was delivered through both television and digital channels.
To support their organic profile launch, a fun daily series broadcasting from the Costa Toscana with Italian celebrities Orietta Berti and Fabio Rovazzi were pushed through Top Feed Spark Ads. Little Leo’s video posted by his parents became firstly a TVC delivered on major Italian television channels during the Sanremo Music Festival and then was pushed on TikTok through TopView.
The Results
The Costa campaign was a huge success, securing maximum visibility for the brand. Consumers showed a genuine interest in the campaign and the message that was being delivered. The campaign generated +190% Brand Attribution compared to previous brand campaigns and reached overall positive brand sentiment along with a high engagement rate +88% VTR vs benchmark.
In terms of business KPIs, the overall brand activation during Sanremo Music Festival brought incredible results, such as revenue increase and inbound calls doubling.
Our first approach to the platform brought us excellent results and confirmed that we were on the right path. The channel's use of native creativity, which even later landed on TV and digital platforms, made this initiative even more striking.
