Last year, CeraVe took the Super Bowl by storm with its 'Michael CeraVe' ad, an ad they had been building momentum for over months with cleverly crafted creator collaborations and social activations.
The campaign was a masterstroke, with CeraVe earning 32 billion impressions and record-breaking sales in one week.
It was ambitious and creative, while also being precise and data-driven.
Two of the creatives behind the campaign, Allen Ortega, Global Head of Social & Influence at CeraVe, and Olivia Prendergast, Associate Director, Strategy at Ogilvy, spoke at PI LIVE x IMS USA about the campaign.
They got under the bonnet of what appeared to be a meticulously designed and well-oiled machine, to expose that much of the campaign originated from serendipity, as well as swiftly finding solutions to unexpected obstacles.
For example, the entire idea of building the campaign around Michael Cera came from a Reddit post the team found on r/stupidquestions late one night. The post asked, “Did Michael Cera develop CeraVe?”
Prendergast explained that, after laughing about this for a while, the team suddenly realised the potential in this idea.
‘Did Michael Cera develop CeraVe? No, CeraVe is developed with dermatologists’, became the strapline moving forwards.
I caught up with the two speakers after their session to learn more about the campaign, how they overcame obstacles, the role of data, crafting a full-funnel creator-driven campaign, and how CeraVe will be branding itself moving forward.
Sol Wilkinson: Hey, we're here at PI LIVE x IMS USA in very sunny Florida, and I'm here with two of the geniuses behind the Michael CeraVe campaign for the Super Bowl that went viral last year, Allen Ortega, Global Head of Social & Influence at CeraVe, and Olivia Prendergast, Associate Director, Strategy at Ogilvy. How are you both doing?
Olivia Prendergast (OP): We're good. We're happy to be out here in Florida.
Allen Ortega (AO): Likewise, yeah, excited. Awesome.
SW: You both just hosted a session on the IMS stage that I thought was really interesting, delving into the mechanics and origins behind the Michael CeraVe campaign. I'd like to start there.
Olivia, you said that after viewing the brief from CeraVe, you found a Reddit post that inspired the tagline and content of the campaign. What was it about this post that sparked the idea that this could blow up into something?
OP: We knew that we had to say CeraVe is developed by dermatologists. When we saw the Reddit question saying, “Did Michael Cera develop CeraVe?”, it really was kind of an easy segue.