Black Friday is the peak shopping moment of the year in Brazil, consumers are most ready to open wallets. However, standing out during this event is challenging due to three main reasons:

(1) TV is the most popular medium and advertising slots are fiercely competed over not just by the usual discount-heavy competitors but also by lesser-known brands aiming for a slice of the pie.

(2) Most of these brands are doing pretty much the same: huge fonts, urgent voiceovers, loud sounds to grab attention, promoting "unmissable" deals that often leave consumers skeptical.

(3) Despite being the biggest ecommerce in Latin America, Mercado Libre was not associated to promotions an huge discounts.

To break through this clutter, it was necessary to change Mercado Libre's approach and meet our business and branding goals: drive more traffic to our website and app, increase sales during the period, and become a top-of-mind brand."

Instead of competing for space during crowded ad breaks, we took a unique approach with our "brand-promo-content". We noticed that handshakes—featured in Mercado Libre's logo—appear frequently across TV shows. So, we tracked over 2,000 of these handshakes during programming on Brazil's largest TV channel, TV Globo, and paired each one with exclusive QR codes. When viewers scanned these QR codes, they unlocked discount coupons. That’s right, every handshake was a chance to snag an unbeatable deal. A handshake in a soap opera? Discount. On the morning show? Discount. During the news? Discount.

To keep the excitement going for 45 straight days, the coupons improved as Black Friday approached. The real thrill came with offering these discount coupons at unexpected moments for a very limited time, creating a rush every time a coupon was released.

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In our campaign, we gathered three distinct types of data:

Behavioral Data: gathered from research, news sources, and internal analysis. It revealed key insights, such as the ineffectiveness of traditional TV ad breaks, a growing consumer skepticism towards period-specific discounts, and the critical importance of TV audience for achieving results.

Audience Data: helped us refine our media strategy by identifying the optimal times when the largest TV audiences were available and engaged.

Broadcaster Programming Database: This tool, augmented by artificial intelligence, was essential in the strategic execution of our campaign. It enabled us to identify handshakes in scenes that had already been recorded or were planned in scripts.

We cross-referenced all these data sets with Mercado Livre's own database to align our strategy with the brands most compelling Black Friday offers. This integration helped us identify potential interest matches among consumers, enhancing the overall effectiveness of our business strategy.

We launched the "Handshake Hunt" in a groundbreaking collaboration with Globo, the world's second-largest TV network. This campaign embedded our discounts directly into Globo's most-watched shows, linking each handshake scene with exclusive offers.

Our first step was to analyze Globo's scripts and scenes, identifying every handshake beforehand. Next, we created a series of educational content to show viewers how to access these discount coupons. Whenever a handshake appeared in any show, a QR code popped up on the screen.

To ensure no one missed out, we leveraged out-of-home (OOH) advertising and influencers to create buzz among those not currently watching TV.

This campaign ran for 45 days, keeping viewers engaged and on the lookout for the best deals throughout TV programming. It marked a novel approach to Black Friday promotions and became the most successful campaign in Mercado Libre's history. The best part? None of our competitors could replicate it.

Despite the market experiencing one of its worst Black Fridays in Brazilian history, Handshake Hunt campaign turned out to be the best Black Friday in Mercado Libre's history. The innovative campaign reached 80 million people and achieved 7.8 billion impressions. It significantly boosted Mercado Libre's brand presence, with a 5p.p. increase in top-of-mind awareness, giving the brand the first place in its category. Additionally, brand consideration grew 7p.p compared to the previous year.

The campaign also drove a remarkable 14% increase in app and website sessions during the same period YOY. Sales on Black Friday day surged by 80%, and when considering the entire month, there was a 39% YOY increase. Transactions went up by 27%, and the use of coupons exploded with a 283% increase compared to the previous year.

Handshake Hunt not only captivated audiences but also dramatically enhanced Mercado Libre's market performance during a challenging season.