The Facebook Mask function typically provides funny/silly masks to "wear" virtually over your face via your mobile phone's camera. Great for augmented reality "selfies." I'm sure you've seen them. Well, Pedigree has not only made these masks ingeniously useful, but has introduced a mechanism that will build powerful affinity for the brand.
They call it "The Adoptable Mask." Here's a short video explaining the concept:
More dog owners.
It's in Pedigree's interest to increase the universe of dog owners. The more dog owners there are, the more dog food the brand can sell.
And this idea scores high on the cute factor. No, better than that, it scores high on the cute animal factor, which is far more potent. Because the app is fun to use I can imagine some percentage of people who may be on the fence about actually getting a new pet will be pushed off that fence.
But it's more than fun, it's a good deed. How brilliant for this brand - a dog food brand - to bridge potential dog owners to local shelters.
Put more clinically, this idea sits squarely in the "Consideration" stage of the purchase funnel and results in tremendous, slippery, emotional momentum onto the "Purchase" stage.
And no one loses in this transaction. The dog wins, the dog owner wins and the shelter wins. And Pedigree wins big.
Here's why.
New dog owners with powerful emotion attached to Pedigree.
So let's play this out. Someone on the fence about adopting a dog reads this article or otherwise comes into contact with the app, tries the app, finds his or herself slipping past the Consideration stage of the "adoption funnel," and adopts a dog.
Now, in my experience, 99.9999999% of all dog owners love their dogs like family members. They know the exact breed (even if a muttish mix), they have pictures when it was a puppy and are more than willing to share their adoption stories.
Pedigree, for the life of the adopted dog, will be an intimate part of that adoption story. I can already hear dog owners in 3, 5, 10 years answering the adoption question, "Pedigree connected me to Rex through this cool Facebook app."
That is marketing gold, my friends.
Further, consider the fact that all marketing and advertising is a game of percentages and odds. You try something and hope for a significant percentage of people to take action. The fact that Pedigree connected you to your new best friend is a unique kind of emotion, and will likely not go unrewarded.
Of those who connect to a dog using this app, a larger portion than current market-share percentages will reward Pedigree by buying the brand's dog food. Not everyone, of course. But a larger percentage than normal market forces.
Not to mention those who already have a dog hear about this Pedigree program to connect shelter dogs with new families and then also reward the brand.
It's a simple idea and it comes right out of their brand idea, "Feed the good." I would try it myself if I didn't already have two rescue dogs. Now I just hope my family can stay away from this incredible idea.
Well done, Pedigree.
