Warc Awards announces 2020 Effective Social Strategy winners

How KFC's #1 Fan Charmed Millions.

Campaigns for KFC in Malaysia, Amazon Prime Reading in China, Burger King in the US, El Tiempo in Colombia, German Rail in Germany, Skoda in France and WWF in the UK, are among the winners of the Effective Social Strategy category of the Warc Awards, a global search for next-generation marketing effectiveness.

Reprise in Malaysia has won the Grand Prix for How KFC's #1 Fan Charmed Millions. The fast-food brand used a comedic take on a social influencer to drive affinity with millennials in Malaysia.

To combat a series of critical price-based social media posts, which sparked a national debate on rising prices within the fast-food industry, KFC launched a tactical free chicken promotion to reignite love amongst teens and young adults, and drive footfall in-store. KFC introduced its number-one fan, Mat Ayam Free, who drove affinity with millennials by hijacking other carefully curated top celebrities' Instagram pages, while shamelessly promoting KFC's chicken.

The campaign successfully increased brand share amongst teens and young adults by 4% each, gained exposure to the combined influencers' audience of 20.3m followers, gained 2.5m followers of its own with 6.6m impressions and reversed negative social sentiment.

Three special awards have also been given in specific areas of excellence:

• Path-to-Purchase Award, for a social strategy that successfully drove sales, has been awarded to Memac Ogilvy for Scroll-Thru, for which KFC Arabia created an innovative drive-thru experience to boost revenue and increase take-up of its online delivery business in the Middle East.

• Smart Spender Award, for a social strategy that was effective on a budget of $500K or less, has been awarded to Facebook Creative Shop for Great Work - WWF's Black Friday Twist. Wildlife conservation charity World Wide Fund for Nature ran a subversive Black Friday promotion to drive endangered animal adoptions in the UK.

• Live Award, for the best real-time campaign that has helped the brand achieve a specific business result, has been awarded to MullenLowe US for #NotAJoke. Non-profit gun safety organisation Change The Ref used comedian Louis CK and his words about shooting victims to create a stand-up 'comedy' act to bring gun-control conversation into pop culture in the US.

The full winners' list, as voted by the 15-strong jury of agency- and client-side industry professionals are as follows:

Grand Prix:

• How KFC's #1 fan charmed millions · KFC· QSR Stores Sdn Bhd · Reprise · Malaysia

Gold:

• No Need to Fly - Around the World in Germany · German Rail · Ogilvy Germany · Germany
• Twitter Bait · Burger King · Restaurant Brands International · MullenLowe US · United States

Silver:

• Celebrating Subcultures · Burger King · Restaurant Brands International · MullenLowe US · United States
• Scroll-Thru · KFC · Yum! Brands MENAPKT · Memac Ogilvy · Middle East (general region) + Path-to-Purchase Award
• Everyone is an Amazing Book · Amazon Prime Reading · Amazon China · McCann Worldgroup China · China
• Bring Back the Idols · Snickers · Mars Japan · BBDO Japan · Japan
• #WomenRewriteWomen · El Tiempo · MullenLowe SSP3 · Colombia

Bronze:

• Be a Masshole, Not an Asshole · Yes on 3 Coalition · MullenLowe US · United States
• Hesitation · SKODA · RE-MIND PHD · France
• Great Work - WWF's Black Friday twist · WWF · Facebook Creative Shop · United Kingdom + Smart Spender Award
• The Gift of Social Commerce · Lady's Choice · Unilever · Ogilvy Philippines Inc. · Philippines
• #NotAJoke · Change the Ref · MullenLowe US · United States + Live Award

Lex Bradshaw-Zanger, CMO, L'Oréal UK and Ireland and chair of the jury, commented:

As social grows in scope and becomes more firmly rooted in commerce, this year's winners show a range of social strategies, truly engaging the consumer, from across the world that practitioners can learn from and be inspired by, helping to build future growth across a multitude of sectors.

The Grands Prix and Special Awards winners across the four categories of the Warc Awards share a $40,000 prize fund.

More information on the Warc Awards is available here.