Awareness days are a great way for companies to launch creative campaigns that promote their brand, and the most effective ones use these days to link back to the products and services they provide.
With a compelling campaign and a clear message, your business can drive engagement and start conversations on social media, enabling you to attract new customers and grow your audience.
Over the years we’ve seen really creative Mother’s Day campaigns from brands which captured different aspects of motherhood, so here’s a rundown of the campaigns we found the most effective.
1. Samsung, ‘Texts From Mom’, 2015
This comical ad campaign from Samsung had unseen adults scrolling through standard texts from their mums with the tagline “This Sunday, give her a call.”. Some highlights included general check ups, a mother’s rambling about everything and a couple funny attempts at social media slang.
Why it’s effective
Humour is used strategically to create an entertaining campaign that would trigger an “I know the feeling” reaction. Samsung also didn’t focus on pushing a product, trusting its light-hearted, relatable campaign would leave an impact on viewers next time they bought their products. By keeping the name centre screen and featuring the product’s SMS, Samsung was able to maintain brand recognition while linking their services back to the theme of motherhood.
2. Procter & Gamble, ‘Strong’, 2016
This American consumer giant developed a heartwarming Mother’s Day campaign for the 2016 Summer Olympics. With the tagline “it takes someone strong to make someone strong”, it showed supportive mothers helping their children persevere through difficult circumstances on their way to becoming successful Olympic athletes.
Why it’s effective
The campaign was effective with how it paralleled difficult circumstances in childhood with competitive sports in adulthood, allowing the audience to relate through their own memories of how mothers empower you to face your fears no matter how big or small. P&G enabled the audience to emotionally connect with its audience without blatantly selling its feminine care brands, presenting itself as an empathetic company to mothers.
3. Tesco, ‘#EveryMum’, 2020
Grocery chain Tesco celebrated Mother’s Day with a campaign that highlighted the lived experiences of different types of mums, including stepmoms, foster mums, biological mums, adoptive mums, aunts, and more.
Why it’s effective
Using real-life experiences allowed Tesco to create a compelling campaign by promoting inclusivity on a holiday when non-traditional families may feel overlooked. It reminded the audience that no matter what type of mum you have they all provide the same love and care, successfully tugging at viewers’ heartstrings.
4. Waitrose, ‘Opting Out Email’, 2021
Last year Waitrose decided to place customer experience at the forefront by providing an opt-out option for customers that might find Mother’s Day to be a delicate and/or triggering subject. This opt-out only prevented customers from receiving Mother’s Day related promotions and still gave them access to Waitrose’ normal emails and latest news.
Why it’s effective
This time of year can be emotional taxing for those who have lost their mothers or are no longer in contact with them. So Waitrose demonstrated a good understanding of this by giving their customers the choice of whether to receive these emails. The email marketing campaign showed the brand to be thoughtful and sensitive.
5. Billie, ‘Postpartum Portraits’, 2021
https://www.instagram.com/p/COiuH6GNUqH/
Shaving company Billie partnered with Spanish photographer and filmmaker Camila Falquez to release a series of portraits that captured the beauty of postpartum bodies. Recognising the societal pressure to ‘snap back’ and maintain a ‘healthy’ body following pregnancy, these photos are meant to relieve women of this stress.
Why it’s effective
Billie’s brand focuses on loving the skin you’re in, celebrating the diversity of bodies from women, men and gender non-conforming people and how they embrace themselves with their body, hair and skincare products. The campaign embodied this sentiment by showing the importance of accepting your body and the different changes it goes through with pregnancy in a poignant, wholesome way.