We’ve worked on some the biggest horror franchises of all time but it’s fair to say that Countdown was a horror film for the digital age, centred around a chilling app that tells you when you were going to die.
This unique premise required a digitally savvy campaign recognising an audience who spend their lives scrolling apps, messaging friends and snapping selfies. We started the countdown to deliver an integrated campaign where our PR, Social and Creative teams would work closely together to ensure this was the must-see horror film of Halloween 2019.
What We Did
At the heart of the film was a terrifying if somewhat mysterious demon, Ohzin, which gave us an excellent opportunity to build a unique stunt that really spoke to the audience. It was crucial to stand out from previous horror stunts so we tactically aimed to reach a younger Insta-age audience by partnering with two leading British influencers – one known for iconic horror make-up and another for his hilarious pranks.
The collaboration saw them scare a whole host of unsuspecting influencers in a social media focused photo-booth at an exclusive screening of the film. The campaign also brought terror to the timeline with innovative, relatable social content across owned channels and Instagram banter accounts.
Impact
The result was a highly effective, targeted campaign for this smaller budget horror tapping into the digital behaviours of its audience. Influencer activity reached close to 19 million people scaring up hundreds of thousands of views and likes across multiple platforms.
Conjuring even more cut-through, our thumb-stopping and relatability-driven social content reached over 4 million people on Instagram banter accounts alone and engaged thousands across owned channels.