Olay Professional ProX Launch

In late 2008, P&G was getting ready to launch an exciting new line of products called Pro-X, while at the same time, an entirely new brand — Olay Professional. It was scientifically advanced. Clinically proven. And expensive. Almost twice the price of the average Olay product.Digitas was asked to Prelaunch Olay Professional and Pro-X to generate buzz, excitement, and ultimately capture our target’s imagination enough to pre-buy and pre-order the Pro-X Starter Protocol ($65). This was to be achieved exclusively through imedia. And in the midst of a recession.

We decided to create a multi-phased, integrated email and online pre-launch teaser campaign that would drive women to a version of olayprofessional.com that contained no information except a live counter counting down the minutes until the limited release sale. After the pre-release, we would reveal information about the breakthrough new products and later, leverage a sold-out claim to further drive pre-order demand.

It worked. At 12:00 pm on 12/03/08, the Olay Professional site went live, and an unprecedented 17 minutes later, the entire first release of Pro-X starter kits had sold out.

By the time Olay Professional “officially” launched, (1/12/09 in typical consumer goods fashion with full blown TV and print):

Nearly 20,000 Pro-X protocols had already been pre-sold
2.1 million online media impressions had been made
2.7 million emails had been delivered
OlayProfessional.com had already received more than 300,000 visitors

[P&G executives also said they see continued opportunity to trade consumers up, despite the economy...]

“To anyone who has any doubts about the viability of ProX, we sold out the first 1,000 starter kits to our Olay Club members in just 17 minutes last week.”

Ed Shirley, Vice Chairman P&G Global Beauty and Grooming in Advertising Age

“I’m really impressed by the entire Olay ProX digital marketing and e-commerce program — best I’ve seen. I want to make sure we share learnings quickly and reapply across Beauty. Thanks and WAY TO GO!”

Gina Drosos, President P&G Global Personal Beauty

Creative Director: Andrew Boal
Art Director: Heather Brooks
Copywriter: Ellen Learner

Olay Professional ProX Launch

2 Comments

2 Trackbacks