With a shrinking category (down 2%) and the closure of key retailer Toys ‘R’ Us creating a potential 9-figure loss in sales as a result, LEGO Group had a bigger challenge to overcome than just relevance in the key holiday period. More than 450 LEGO sets are available per year, many of which aren’t listed on brick & mortar shelves, and shopping behaviors are changing. We needed to bolster brand discoverability for shoppers to win the key holiday shopping season. The frustration for parents was that with screens shrinking and more choices than ever, it was becoming increasingly hard for them to find the right gifts, at the right price points for their child. We had to revitalize this iconic brand and reestablish it as the icon of 2018, to ensure LEGO sets weren’t left on the wish list pile.

The moment we all feared for had come, kids were putting LEGO on their wish list, but Mom wasn’t buying the product. As the gatekeeper to over 70% of household purchases, Mom had the power to either make or break our chance of success and held the future of the brand in her hands. If we don’t win with Mom, we become extinct. The LEGO toypocolypse was on the horizon. It was time to make a bold bet: we had to rip up the stale and outdated gift guides of the past, and transform it into something more creative, contemporary and completely eye-catching…introducing, the first ever algorithmic toy picker…Brick Bot. With the ability to listen, learn and get smarter, in just a few small clicks, Brick Bot had the power to filter over 650,000 possibilities into one single personalized recommendation, getting LEGO off the wish list to save the day.

In order to win over Mom, we built a completely new purchase journey that leveraged the power of AI to change the way Mom shopped for LEGO sets. That meant leading with passion points not product, only making recommendations that matched each shoppers’ specific criteria (Interests, age, gender), ensuring recommendations were in the right price bracket and available at their preferred retailer. Using the real time data and shopping behaviors, the ad then streamlined recommendations to those that drove the most interest and interactions. Mom doesn’t always know the specific LEGO set her child wants, but she knows the things they are passionate about, so we had to lead the conversations with the things they know.

The ‘brick bot’ was activated at key shopper journey moments in the day. The ‘brick bot’ was a seamless in-ad integration that allowed users to interact on site, rather than be interrupted and taken to a new site. Intercepting Mom’s shopping journey, we deployed the ad across mobile, tablet and desktop, reaching her on the platforms she used the most. Perfectly aligned with the larger brand campaign, we went live at the intersection of two key gifting periods in the toy categories crucial ‘Turkey Five’ (Thanksgiving) timeframe. The first being when kids are creating their wish lists in mid – late November, and the second being at the point when Moms gift purchase frequency is highest at the start of December. This allowed us to drive up the relevance of the LEGO brand and convert the purchase.

100% of sales with Toys ‘R’ Us were successfully re-distributed to other retailers across the campaign. Not only did we buck category convention, we helped LEGO Group deliver sales goals.

Destroying all media benchmarks, the ‘brick bot’ was the best performing Watson ad of 2018 with:

• Purchase intent increasing by 20%,

• A conversion rate 3.5X higher than benchmarks,

• Moms spending 3X as long interacting than on competitive sites,

• LEGO brand consideration up 18%, and

• 100% brand recall across all Moms who interacted with the unit