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It's the same when you don't have a marketing budget.
Good morning folks,
This week, I'd like to tell you about an experience that really made an impression on me: the 1* gourmet restaurant run by former French Top Chef contestant Adrien Cachot in Paris. At Vaisseau, the principle is simple: a blind menu where you are brought a series of dishes and appetizers... without being given a title or composition. Why did I love the experience? For the fun factor, because this little guessing game keeps you and your table companion busy throughout the meal. But also because your senses are more alert, constantly trying to detect the flavors. It's a concept that could be taken up by other restaurants, with even a single, fixed-hour service (as in Paul Pairet's former Ultraviolet restaurant), so you don't get spooled by your neighbors and get the full experience.
With that gastronomic interlude out of the way, it's time to move on to the other menu: this issue's! Today we're talking about :
a clever (and simple!) operation on Linkedin for a book launch,
a partnership that boosts sales by 38% for a product that doesn't look sexy on paper,
a campaign that succeeded in changing the scripts of 30 plays to raise awareness of breast cancer (and trigger 60,000 mammograms),
cities using nudge marketing to reduce noise pollution (-30%!),
the Google Maps underside com channel,
a French startup's well-intentioned partnership with... a comedian, and much more!
Enjoy your reading!
PS: for those of you who have been following my adventures with ice cream, Louis Vuitton has just launched its 1st "ice cream kiosk", in Tuscany. Proof, if proof were needed, of this market's playground... (On the other hand, I was expecting more in the way of DA and experience!)
🍦 Kéliane — Mail / Instagram / Linkedin
The best hack to get a book launch off the ground
In short — Earlier this year, Rémi Babinet, founder of the French advertising agency BETC, published "Pas de publicité merci", a 1,300-page book in which he looks back on the greatest hits of his career and some outstanding campaigns. Except that to launch it, he had the idea of playing on Linkedin's putaclic side by offering to send a free PDF of his book to anyone who commented on the post. Which he obviously didn't do (or at least he sent a pdf so heavy it couldn't be downloaded): there was a wolf. It was really just a technique to attract visibility.
Why it matters — Because Linkedin's algo' loves comments (more than likes): the more comments your post receives, the more visible it will be. Hence the famous "leave XXX as a comment to receive XXX" techniques. The result? 300,000 impressions, +9825% subscribers compared to the previous day and a stock-out in 3 weeks. Of course, an advertising man knows how to (sell) himself.
Light projections on the ground have reduced night-time noise pollution by 30% (without police intervention).
In short — ‘Shut up!’. This is the kind of luminous ground message Rotterdam is testing in one of the city's noisiest night-time districts. The city has embarked on a year-long test, with a variety of messages (some of them very cashsome for publicity purposes!) and images projected to measure which will have the most concrete impact on noise reduction.
Why it matters — It's not the only city to use this nudge marketing technique: Leuven also uses projections to combat night-time nuisance in party districts. After A/B testing several formats (stickers on the ground, reduction or increase in the intensity of public lighting according to noise levels, etc.), it found that luminous projections of messages on the ground simply asking residents to respect their sleep led to a 30% reduction in noise, without police intervention.
→ Explanation of the Rotterdam and Leuventests
Changing the script of a play to talk about screening... and triggering 60,000 mammograms
In short — During Pink October, the Argentinean League Against Cancer mobilized the entire Buenos Aires theater scene - over 30 shows - to make marginal changes to their scripts. Each show introduced a scene in which breast cancer was mentioned, as a reminder of the importance of annual screening. The result? Over 100,000 spectators were "subtly" touched, under the guise of entertainment.
Why it matters— Every year in October, the League is faced with the same challenge: to draw attention to a public health problem in an original way, over a short time window. So the choice to focus on plays was a wise one, to capitalize on the intimacy of the stories told and show that cancer can affect anyone. It was also a two-stage "coup" that not only reached the spectators who were physically present, but also generated press coverage, thereby spreading the word about screening. And, above all, La Ligue didn't just talk about the subject in prime-time venues: it turned all tickets to these plays into vouchers for a free mammogram.
→ Watch the case study of the campaign
When pizzerias turn into microwave stores in Brazil
In short — Let's face it: microwaves rarely generate interest, making it difficult to launch a new model and generate curiosity or excitement around it. So a Brazilian brand, Consul, has come up with an original idea: to capitalize on the trend for reheated pizza (the famous "it's even better the next day"), because its new microwave has a special pizza mode that humidifies the air while grilling the cheese. How do we do it? By teaming up for two weeks with 20 of São Paulo's best pizzerias, exceptionally open from breakfast and equipped with microwaves to reheat and sell the previous day's pizzas. Customers could even buy microwaves at a 30% discount.
Why it matters — Because I think it's smart to have the humility to recognize that it's a long way to go to make noise with a microwave launch, and to fall back on a logic of partnerships (a mechanism that other brands could adopt). And as always, it's the tangible impact that counts: 3,400 microwaves sold in pizzerias, +38% sales compared to the previous product launch, +56% purchase consideration and, of course, but more incidentally, buzz on social networks (80k brand mentions, 250k online searches, +18% website traffic).
→ Watch the case study of the campaign
The startup that debunks corpo' bullshit
In short — For its latest brand campaign, PayFit wanted to reach out to entrepreneurs who have just launched their business, just as they're getting structured and discovering the hell of payroll. So what better way to talk about administrative headaches than with a creator, Galansire (384k followers on Instagram), who makes fun of corporate bullshit with a well-measured sense of humor?
Why it's interesting — As always with this kind of operation, the clever thing is 1) to broadcast on the creator's account to reach an audience that wouldn't take the step of following a brand account: a way of breaking the corporate glass ceiling (do the test of thinking about how many brands you follow yourself on Instagram...) and 2) to give the influencer carte blanche over the format, so that he stays true to what makes his account so successful. The result? 271k views on Instagram in 24 hours.
To go further - For orders of magnitude, PayFit has... 6,000 followers on Instagram. If the brand wanted to go all the way, it would close its account and put its budget and teams on partnerships.
Climax gives kiosks new visibility... via Google Maps
In short — Hackiosques: that's the name of a small but symbolic operation by the French ecological media Climax to support newsstands, which are gradually disappearing in France as a result of falling paper sales. So they had some fun by putting photos with their mag and a little love note on the Google Maps of 100 newsagents in Paris, Marseille, Bordeaux and Brive-la-Gaillarde. The aim? To remind people that newsstands and the print media still have a bright future ahead of them!
Why it matters — Because it remains one of the most consulted tools in the world, and an under-used communication channel. Of course, we're talking about the symbolic here, but it's not bad enough to get a message across without a media budget, without wild billboards, just with a forgotten digital space, hijacked to serve a very real cause: boosting the print media.
IT MAY BE A DETAIL FOR YOU, BUT...
🧶 A knitting event in a movie theater - It's not intuitive, but the new generation is passionate about knitting and crocheting... and meets up at the movie theater to share this hobby in front of a film. It's a trend that 's really catching on in South Korea too!
🎙️ What if we reinvented the TED format with questions instead of answers? - In
, has come up with a new format for TED talks (which he sees being initiated by Perplexity AI): instead of the traditional speaker pitching a carefully prepared story, it would be more of an exploration, with researchers sharing the unresolved questions that obsess them. Gone would be the rows of seats facing the stage, replaced by "curiosity labs" in small groups.☑️ The Bucket List of 100 must-try restaurants - Datagif's (very good) newsletter spotted this New York Times article with, beyond the selection, a feature I love: checkboxes! It's very simple, but on each restaurant page, you can check off "I want to try it" and "I've already tried it". It's a handy way of making your own personal list, and it's also smart for the media, as you can go back to the page to check it off.
🔈 Big Flo et Oli's coffee shop-label - In 2022, the 2 rappers opened Café Visionnaire, their coffee shop in the heart of Toulouse. Today, they're taking the project a step further by turning it into an independent label. The Visionnaire Records café now hosts live sessions to introduce new artists, and broadcasts playlists concocted by Big Flo et Oli, also available on Spotify, Apple Music & co. and pressed on vinyl, for sale.
💌 What if the great figures of history wrote to your children? - This is the new concept from the Quelle Histoire publishing house: Les courriers de l'Histoire. Each month, a child receives a letter in his or her name, written by a great figure from history (Marie Curie, Leonardo da Vinci...), sharing his or her joys, doubts and hopes, and inviting the child to reflect and imagine. At the end, the child must take up the pen to invent the next flying machine, write a fable or draw the plans for his or her own castle.
🏃🏻♀️ A sports race - The Kazidomi food brand seized the opportunity of Belgium's most iconic race, the 20 kms de Bruxelles, with its 60,000 participants, to promote its new brandn. How did they do it? Simply by taking part in the race with a giant bar on your back.
🥕 Tell me what's on sale, I'll tell you what to cook... - In the UK, in response to concerns about purchasing power, an agency has created the Yellow Sticker Cookbook, an app that lets consumers scan products on special offer in supermarkets to get cheap recipes based on these ingredients. A relevant idea for a major retailer wishing to make a commitment on the subject, or for C'est qui le patron or Too Good To Go. In the same vein, delivery service SkipTheDishes launched The Inflation Cookbook.
🤓 Le 1er Book Club... de papiers scientifiques - Howtown, a medium launched by 2 former Vox journalists, has just launched its Sciences Paper Book Club, with the ambition of democratizing access to science.
🥊 POV of an amateur MMA - Robin Hamel, 23, decided to share on Insta his daily life as an amateur MMA fighter, far from the glitz, to let people discover the behind-the-scenes of this sport through his training, his fights, but also nutrition or how he manages his studies and work in parallel.
💬 The smallest social network, guaranteed without algo ' - Month Friend has an original concept : randomly match 2 strangers and have them correspond by e-mail with one message a day for a month, guided by more or less profound questions about your culinary tastes or what you're most proud of. The idea? To recreate the alchemy of summer camp encounters, where you meet up with strangers and start chatting... without knowing if you'll ever see each other again.
👴🏻 What do you want to be... when you retire? - Children are often asked what they want to be when they grow up. But an Australian insurance company came up with the idea of twisting it by having adults interview children with The Never Too Late Show (I love the name). Very cute and inspiring to think about your Bucket List!
That's all for today! See you on Tuesday June 24 for the next issue!
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