Building Awareness and Generating Trial With Celebrity Influencers

Challenge

When Land O’Frost was set to introduce a new product, Gone Rogue High Protein Chicken Chips, the company looked to MERGE to help build awareness and drive trial for the first-of-its-kind product.

Land O’Frost needed a way to connect with and entice the product’s target audience: athletic adults between the age of 25-54 within several target regional markets. 

In addition to attracting consumer audiences, Land O’Frost sought attention for Gone Rogue from retailers to drive in-store access to the product. 

Solution

MERGE deployed a strategy centered around celebrity endorsers supporting a mix of in-person events and virtual media tours. The endorsers included four high-profile professional athletes at the height of their career: 

• MLB all-star Hunter Pence
• NFL player Mitch Trubisky
• NFL player Adam Thielen
• Pro soccer player Carli Lloyd

In addition to consumer and retailer meet-and-greets, the athletes each endorsed the brand as an integral part of their training routines on their social media platforms, Gone Rogue’s social media accounts and secured local and national media interviews.  Serena Williams, LeBron James, Tom Brady, and Alex Morgan.

Results

Through timely celebrity engagement across 2 in-person activations in the Chicago and San Francisco markets, 3 virtual activations targeting the midwest and national markets Gone Rogue earned the attention of:

• Consumers nationwide  
• Regional retailer partners 
• Regional and national media 

Highlights of national media include interviews with athletic-oriented outlets such as ESPN, Sports Illustrated, FOX Sports, NFL.com, the Athletic, among others.

The attention resulted in multiple correlated spikes on Gone Rogue’s Amazon storefront and for three days around the Trubisky event, Gone Rogue became the number 1 selling item in Amazon’s Healthy Snacks & Beverages category.