San Francisco-based Del Monte Foods is one of the USA’s largest producers, distributors and marketers of premium quality, branded food products for the retail market.

Challenge

Del Monte wanted to strengthen ties to Thanksgiving and drive brand interaction and engagement with the famous Del Monte green beans. 

Solution

Del Monte produced original content – an entertaining campaign that utilised content in new and innovative ways – and amplified it across all screens to bump Thanksgiving and holiday promotions.

The brand bolstered seasonal content for its audience through Vibrant Amplify, the Vibrant Media service which commissions, curates, and natively distributes brands’ paid, owned, and earned content in relevant editorial articles. The range of Vibrant Amplify content marketing units give consumers much greater access to brands’ digital content compared to relying solely on search engines or the reach of a brand’s social media profiles. Vibrant Amplify units also give consumers control and choice, as a variety of relevant branded content can be presented on screen at the same time. 

Process

The full campaign included recipes, top tips, engaging articles and ideas. Each piece of content was designed to help consumers achieve a successful and stress-free Thanksgiving meal. Content included “Healthy Twists on a Holiday Classic” and “Top Ten Tips for Smart Holiday Entertaining” — with an original green bean casserole recipe developed exclusively for Del Monte. 

Del Monte also created data-driven stories for mass media coverage by partnering with PR Hacker, an agency that specializes in story based, data-driven content that creates news. For this part of the campaign, Del Monte asked 1,500 Americans to “go green bean” and rate their fondness for the classic green-bean casserole side dish. This resulted in the first annual “Del Monte® Green Bean Index” — a ranking of the top 25 U.S. states with the highest concentration of green-bean casserole lovers for the holidays.

Results

The campaign achieved high interaction rates and an estimated 80 million total audience in less than two weeks through impressive rates of viral sharing and coverage of the Del Monte Green Bean Index on more than 100 media outlets — including top media outlets such as Bloomberg and Yahoo Travel, plus dozens of local TV news stations.