Beware of the bugs – A characterful campaign to keep travellers safe.
Beware of the bugs – A characterful campaign to keep travellers safe.
UK travellers are remarkably apathetic about catching something unpleasant on an exotic trip. It’s an issue that many initiatives have tried to change. Trouble is, even if travellers do understand the importance of seeking pre-travel health advice, they often face limited assistance from existing services, or have issues finding a local travel health specialist in the first place. To fill these gaps, Valneva’s aim was to reinforce the need to seek advice (well before travelling) and to provide access to comprehensive services.
Our ‘Beware of the Bugs’ campaign was based on the insight that we’re far less worried about things that don’t feel tangible to us, like invisible bugs. To engage our disinterested travellers, we decided to personify the bugs and give each one its own character profile.
With a strong and playful visual identity, we were able to share the hard-hitting facts without coming across as too scaremongering. As we developed the idea, we were inspired by ‘wanted’ posters and took visual and copy cues from this, creating engaging mug shots with ‘unwanted’ signs.
We built a content-rich campaign landing page for Valneva, where customers were able to find out more about each disease and locate their nearest clinic. To drive traffic to this valuable hub, we recruited relevant social micro-influencers and launched owned and paid social ads. This medium served our objective perfectly as we were able to target potential travellers with destination-specific creative and encourage them to seek advice.
people reached via paid social advertising
people reached via micro-influencer activity
As a result of the micro-influencer campaign, we reached over 1.5m people and achieved more than 70,000 engagements over a six-month period. The social advertising campaign was seen by over 20m and drove a strong conversion rate of 88%.