We helped MailChimp say “hi” to the world in a way that felt right to them: by having fun with their name.

We created a massive real-world and online search campaign featuring nine standalone pieces with names that all kind of sound like “MailChimp.” Using mispronunciation as our creative device, we created a collection of cultural activations, including FailChips: a real brand of crushed potato chips.

We distributed over 200,000 bags of FailChips and created an OOH and digital campaign to drive awareness of the product.

We knew people would be curious after seeing bags of FailChips, then they’d go searching for answers. So anyone who Googled “FailChips” would then be asked, “Did you mean MailChimp?”

And we’d tell them a story about a courageous, inventive company that believes doing things your way isn’t just more fun, it’s good business.

The final product was a legitimate brand of delicious, crushed potato chips. FailChips were given away as free samples at all locations during the months of February and March.

FailChips also had its own functioning website (www.failchips.com) where users could find more information on the product (and find their way to MailChimp).

We had 269,049 people visit FailChips.com and on average they scrolled through 89% of the site’s content, resulting in 1.5 million page views.

The interest was strong, with 30% of visitors coming to the site directly or via search. And only 15% of our audience left the site without learning more about FailChips, compared to the snack industry’s average bounce rate of 55%.

Not only were we successful in building interest for FailChips, but also MailChimp. MailChimp became the second most searched topic in relation to FailChips.

Plus those who saw the overall campaign showed lifts in key brand attributes over those who didn’t see it, saying MailChimp is a brand that’s inspiring (+25%), authentic (+19%), for me (+14%), innovative (+13%), very different from others in the category (+13%).

Most importantly, 200,000 bags of FailChips found their way into people’s hands.