How we got Guinness’s Attention and Boosted Their Sales

On St. Patrick’s Day 2018, 6 bars used the “Ripples Effect” to wow their customers.

Ripples’ Product Marketing Manager Geva Telem shares all the details on how this campaign came to be: 

I joined Ripples in Spring 2017. The Coffee Ripples product impressed me, but as soon as I signed the paperwork they started talking about their (now our) next innovation – Beer Ripples – a new beer product, and a perfect match for Guinness and its amazing, silky foam head that lasts long after the glass leaves the tap.

Ripples had been in business for just over a year, and already had hundreds of happy customers world-wide printing on top of coffee and cocktails. Proof of concept and demand were already out there in the coffee and hospitality world, but launching a new beer product was a different challenge with a new target – big breweries, and Guinness in particular, with its amazing, silky foam, would be a perfect match for Beer Ripples’ launch (though we can print on any beer type).

Pitching the idea

We decided to act local, and aimed our attention at Guinness Israel, pitching a St. Patrick’s Day campaign to get more exposure for their brand and attract some new Guinness drinkers, hoping to make an impact and get results that would then attract the interest of their global colleagues.

Our pitch hit a sweet spot for the local team, as they are constantly looking for innovation and for new ideas that no one has done before, going the extra mile to give new experiences to their loyal clients and drinkers. They were in.

The campaign and creative

Together with Guinness we selected six bars around Israel (creating a nationwide experience) and built a Facebook Messenger Chatbot for users to interact with and send their selfies to be printed on Guinness pints. We issued a press release to local media that was quickly picked up by the most popular late-night show in Israel. We were psyched, but then we got a big, beautiful cherry on top of our launch sundae: Two Guinness execs from the global team were in town and asked to see Beer Ripples in action. We already had their attention. What a kickoff!

We worked with the bar owners and staff to make sure they knew what to expect from working with this new device that never-before-existed, and how it would help them boost sales and tips and get them more eyeballs and buzz on social media.

The campaign took place over the St. Patrick’s weekend of March 17^th. On the same day we made our product launch announcement for Beer Ripples, now available for purchase in North America. Israeli media outlets covered the launch, sending more people out to our partner’s bars for this new kind of Guinness experience.

The reaction from customers onsite was amazing, if people didn’t send their selfie to be printed they got a branded Guinness graphic (the iconic leprechaun or toucan parrot or a St. Patrick’s Day greeting). We’d attract their attention with that first pint, and naturally their second drink had to be a selfie, or a cool picture of a favorite pet or family member. Customers went crazy with sharing their experience both on social media and with friends and family in closed chat groups.

Results

The activation went even better than we anticipated: For the bars that had had a St. Patrick’s Day campaign in 2017, Guinness consumption grew exponentially. We also managed to extract vital customer details for Guinness from the Facebook Chatbot activation, as hundreds of users interacted with it at the point of sale, answering personal questions in a funny dialogue with the bot. 20% of these users reported that they were drinking Guinness for the first time, just to see it printed.  While waiting for their beer, customers could enjoy a short Guinness quiz — 70% of users answered at least a few questions and either learned something new about the brand (its origins, number of calories in a pint, etc.) or test their own Guinness knowledge.

Following this campaign, on Nov 1st, 2018, we launched the STOUTie with the Guinness Storehouse in Dublin, printing selfies of visitors onto perfect pints of Guinness.

Overall experience

100 users took the time to rate their overall experience, 99 of them rated it at 5/5.

First published: April 24, 2018