Unilever brands take the lead in co-creation

Speaking at a session on consumer creativity on the first day of Spikes 2012, Neil Trinidad, global marketing manager for Pond's, said the company decided to collaborate with Eyeka after getting a little weary of showcasing women as passive recepients of love. 

"Love and romance have always played a key role in Pond's brand story, but while they were engaging, today's modern woman is no longer a damsel in distress," said Trinidad. "She can initiate love."

Together with co-creation company Eyeka, the Pond's team asked consumers to create short videos of about 30 to 60 seconds of their own love stories either through film or animation.

"These videos gave us access to places where the brand wasn't even present," he added.

For the company's oral care brand Closeup, the objective of co-creating campaigns with consumers was to break category convention and make oral care equivalent to personal care, while also establishing its functional benefits of white teeth and fresh breath, said Ishita Sharma, Closeup's global brand manager. 

Sharma and the team were so impressed by the videos and ideas from consumers that they decided to use it across traditional media, Closeup's official website, Facebook and mobile.

"We really wanted to move away from traditional storytelling to story building," she said.

According to Sharma, this gave the brand team access to creative juices from 200,000 minds across 146 countries. "It's an explosion of creativity, where earlier we had three or five ideas sent for research, today we have hundreds."

Sharma concluded the session by urging agencies to tap into these insigts to formulate strategies.