Best Pet Health Brand Strategies: What Did We Learn From 2016?

As 2016 gets smaller and smaller in our rearview, it’s important that the lessons we learned from pet care brands who did it “right” don’t fade away. As marketers, although we always look forward, keeping that rearview mirror in mind is essential to success. So let’s hop in the way-back machine and take a look at pet care brands that cut through the noise and met their audience’s needs in the most innovative ways in 2016.

IAMS Dogumentaries tug at the bark-strings

As any marketer knows, the best way to get your audience to act is to tug on the ol’ heartstrings. IAMS went all in with this philosophy in 2016, creating a digital campaign that showed the emotional side of pet food through the lens of the human/animal bond. These “dogumentaries” were built specifically for social media platforms, which means that they were built to share. The most efficient marketing is the marketing that your audience markets for you, after all.

And share they did. Since the first video was posted to YouTube in October, it’s been viewed 75,000 times, with thousands more views and shares on Twitter and Facebook. These videos buck the norm, however. Instead of your typical 15- to 30-second clip that fits short social media attention spans, the IAMS Dogumentaries are more than three minutes long. They tell complete, emotional stories that anyone with a dog can laugh and cry with. And because these mini-movies are powerful stories instead of quick-hit jokes or commercials, viewers are more than likely to head over to the IAMS website for more information.

The lesson: Story trumps all. Tell your story in an honest, emotional way, and the audience will respond.

Purina’s “Dear Kitten” uses content marketing to the extreme

Purina took the viral video a step farther. In a campaign that began in 2015 but is still attracting eyeballs more than a year and a half later, Purina found a partner who knows how to get the maximum bang for its bark — er, meow. The “Dear Kitten” series combines the longform storytelling we discussed above with three proven Internet things: cat videos, giggle and Buzzfeed.

You can’t predict when or if a video will go viral, but if any outlet has perfected the process, it’s Buzzfeed. By partnering with an outlet that specializes in getting eyeballs on content, Purina created a foolproof campaign. “Dear Kitten” quickly evolved from a one-shot video that hit 25 million sets of eyeballs into a franchise that regularly cracks views in the eight-digit counts on YouTube alone. The flagship video has been shared on Facebook tens of thousands of times as well. Again, letting your audience market for you is virtually priceless.

The lesson: Find partners who specialize in your chosen strategy and then tap into what has worked. Buzzfeed understands how to disperse good content everywhere it can be seen, getting the most bang out of a single idea. That’s pure, uncut content marketing.

Pedigree’s “By My Side” story

Mars, Inc., makers of Pedigree Brand pet food, also jumped deep into the content marketing pool in 2016, creating a four-minute video featuring a veteran with PTSD and his trusty service companion, Wally. The video features almost no branding at all, instead using some subtle product placement. Most importantly, the clip showcases the bond between human and pet, and since April 2016, nearly half a million people have viewed or shared the clip.

That said, the timing and subject matter are what made our tails start thumping. With perhaps the most divisive election in history in process, the clip launched when the country was hip-deep in campaign season. Showcasing a wounded warrior and the dog who helps him cope with the toughest of times during a politically charged time in our country is an interesting and (so far) incredibly effective way to stir a reaction in an audience. Tying a subject (soldiers) that every single person has an opinion about with another (dogs) that is sure to strike a chord with most viewers made any branding or overt messaging unnecessary; people would see that the video was on the Pedigree pages and emotionally connect one with the other. It was a bold play that appears to have paid off.

The lesson: Opportunities to tell a good story are always present; knowing how to capitalize on them is where a smart marketing partner can really help.

Big Heart Pet Brands hit shoppers where they live

Big Heart Pet Brands went a different way in 2016. The maker of pets’ beloved Milk-Bones and Kibbles ’n’ Bits decided to target audiences with pinpoint accuracy. Rather than tell big, bold stories in the great big vacuum of Internet space, Big Heart went with a “boots-on-the-ground” approach, focusing on ultra-specific POP displays tailored not only to specific shoppers but at their specific non-pet interests at various times of the year.

For instance, at Halloween, when parents (and likely pet parents) would be focusing on candy supplies, Big Heart created in-store displays built to fit near the candy aisle. Holiday-appropriate packaging and messaging accompanied the display tactics, and everything was supported by print and digital ads. Big Heart followed the same path for Christmas and Valentine’s Day.

It’s old-school marketing at its finest, but where Big Heart did some big thinking was in its targeting. Themed campaigns are nothing new, but you don’t often see communications and promotions based on specific retailer demographics. Big Heart changed its messaging based on outlet demographics, from the “big on holidays” thrust of Walmart shoppers to the more practical tastes of Kroger shoppers to the app-friendly Target enthusiasts. The back-to-basics-with-a-twist approach worked, as the brand’s in-store sales grew anywhere from 1 percent to 90 percent per retailer.

The lesson: Focus your message on where your audience is, and how they want to hear it, but don’t shoot in the dark. Customer insights can be huge, and partnering with retail giants to get them is worth the effort.