From Russell Crowe to the band, Crowded House, it seems that whenever a success story emerges from our Tasman waters, Australia is quick to lay claim to it. So how do you respond when Australia tries to claim your entire country?

That’s exactly the predicament New Zealand found itself in when the Meat & Livestock body of Australia (MLA) launched its annual Australia Day ad proposing the unthinkable – that New Zealand and Australia merge to form one nation, ‘New Australia-Land’. The proposed merger would see Australia and New Zealand share all the best parts of their respective lands, from a progressive Prime Minister to a world class rugby team, and of course - lamb.

The idea of ‘New Australia-Land’ captivated social media, with thousands of commentators weighing in on the topic. But while it became a trending topic online, we discovered that the Australians had forgotten one vital campaign asset — to register a website for newaustralialand.com.au.

We seized on the opportunity to respond and promptly registered the newaustralialand.com.au domain name.

Within 48hrs we had turned newaustralialand.com.au into a hub of all the wonderful and unique things you could experience in this newly coined nation. But all was not what it seemed. Every single one of the experiences just so happened to already exist in New Zealand.

Armed with nothing but a media pitch and a website, we sought out to target media outlets who had previously covered the news of the MLA ad, leveraging the existing coverage to generate an entirely new narrative of our own.

We seeded the news to high reaching media across TV, online and radio on a Thursday afternoon, embargoed for the Friday morning ahead of Australia Day.

This strategy meant we were able to generate national talkability and awareness across news, lifestyle, radio, culture and travel media - leaving MLA no room to respond.

We made sure the website showcased some of the top natural, cultural and entertainment traits New Zealand has to offer, from thousand-year-old caves filled with ice (not snakes) to journeying through the origins of Middle Earth via a tour of Weta Workshop, “Because Nobody Does Trolls Better Than The Kiwis”.

In social, and wherever the MLA’s annual lamb ad appeared, we cheerfully responded to the proposal, directing everyone to the new nation’s official site.

As the campaign got bigger, so did the audacity of our response. When former Australian Prime Minister, Bob Hawke, and his brewery responded to claims that New Zealand’s beer was superior to Australia’s we retorted

with a post suggesting otherwise.

When there was an outcry from Australian media in regards to our response, we quickly arranged a segment on Australian news breakfast show, Sunrise, for Tourism New Zealand’s General Manager to respond.

With a budget of just $28k USD ($42k NZD) and only 48 hours up our sleeve, our response garnered significant news media interest and coverage, including segments across three major TV networks and headlines across national online news outlets.

Within 48 hours, we had over 114,000 visitors to the site - 50% of which were organic.

KEY NUMBERS:

56 hits across TV, Radio, News, Lifestyle, Trade and Social Media

40m+ Earned Reach

2945% return on a $28k USD investment

Over 1.7m people reached on Facebook with over 95k reactions, comments & shares.

400% increase in website visits

Visitors to our website were almost twice as likely to engage on the page vs. our standard campaign pages (59% Active Visitor Rate vs 30% - 40% from paid activity).

We received 985% more likes than the original MLA ad, as well as 205% more love in the comments section.