My job title at Oniracom is Director of Story. In reality what I do here is work with brands to develop effective messaging and then deliver that messaging with content. Our approach with winning messaging is to focus on reaching consumers emotional centers and trigger a positive affiliation with the brand. This is the first objective.
Easier said than done. So how do you identify these emotion triggers? And how do you know they will produce results and be liked, shared, and drive sales? Consumer tastes and preferences vary, thus no campaign is perfect. However, as creative marketers we are more likely to hit our mark if we do our homework and the client understands the intrinsic value in rich consumer research.
Here at Oniracom, we rely on our Actionable Intelligence™ as the foundation for our client’s messaging and content creation process. Recently, we worked with Pacific Stone Brand to introduce a new line of products for the cannabis industry. After our usual intake meetings were complete, we proceeded to do the research that would drive messaging and voice of the website and content.
Here is what we learned after listening to 25,000 online conversations about cannabis pre-rolls:
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The primary persona we branded Ian. This persona top interest are gardening, health, politics, business, and humor. He is between 31-40 years old and his demographics are 86% White, 8% Black, and 6% Hispanic. We also identified two more personas to craft our messaging around with additional interests including Music, Dating, and College. All three personas were most active on Instagram.
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We identified the top influencers in the category and ranked their influence from 1-100. These influencers will be authentically approached with content and an introduction to the brand physically and digitally.
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We identified the top organizations to market through and ranked them by Influencer Score and we developed a word cloud to focus hashtags and relationship marketing.
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Our research team took a deep dive into the persona psychographics, sentiment & emotion, personality types, and communication style.
Our creative team used this deep knowledge to craft the messaging and voice for the brand. Pacific Stone Brands epitomizes California Beach and Outdoor Cultures and needed messaging that would appeal to this demographic. We learned through our research that we should always show groups of people in our visual messaging. We also learned the importance of authenticity.
So when it was time to start developing the visual media for the website, videos, and social media, we took this message to heart. We settled on a theme around the California Coast and one of the most memorable experience, a bonfire at the beach with a group of friends, music, drinks, and some California Grown Cannabis.
After we completed, the script, storyboard, and shot lists for photo, VR, and video, we began the casting and location search process.
Apparently many people enjoy the thought of spending an evening on a private beach because we had over 400 people respond to our casting call! We prescreened the talent, did on camera interviews, and then nailed down about 50 prospects. Working with Pacific Stone, we cast the final 12 who would be featured.
From our shoot we produced the photo assets, a 30 sec commercial, 20 short Instagram videos, a behind the scenes, and video for the website. And most importantly, we captured a wide variety of content that is the first impression and defined the brand voice that can be carried out to future campaigns.
Enjoy the commercial!
We would love your thoughts and feedback on the Pacific Stone creative. Contact us today!
