SITUATION:

In 2012, with the world watching, NASA landed the Curiosity Rover on Mars. The day it landed is considered its birthday and to celebrate its first birthday, NASA engineers thought it would be fun if the rover could celebrate itself. So they repurposed its onboard soil sample resonator to sing, to itself; Happy Birthday. Unfortunately this didn’t have the effect NASA engineers had in mind, instead the internet quickly saw this as sad and cruel, and named the rover the loneliest robot in the universe.

BRIEF & OBJECTIVES

-Raise awareness of Husqvarna’s robotics division.

-Connect the Husqvarna brand with a new audience, mainly a tech audience.

-Generate coverage in other outlets than garden and home focused outlets.

-Associate the brand more with engineering and advanced technology.

-Demonstrate how advanced Husqvarna’s robotic lawn mowers stand out from the competition and justify the higher price tag.

For the Mars Curiosity Rover’s tenth birthday we developed an app update for Husqvarna’s robotic lawn mowers, giving them the ability to sing Happy Birthday to the loneliest robot in the universe.

This was the first time any brand in the category had engaged in anything outside of pure utility. Instead this update (which of course was opt-in for the user) acted as a demonstration of how advanced Husqvarna’s robotic lawn mowers are and triggered an emotional reaction where people felt inspired to tell friends, post on social media and share the moment of their lawn mowers singing.

Target audience studies show Husqvarna’s ‘Pro Grade Expert’ target relies heavily on people and communities they trust for recommendations on new products. For example their neighbour or friends becomes the most trusted person when it comes to recommending a robotic lawn mower.

Our strategy was to build an experience that got owners talking about their mowers. One that would act as a demonstration of how advanced Husqvarna’s robotic lawn mowers are.

Study’s show that the more human-like robots become, the more advanced they are perceived. So our challenge was to get Husqvarna’s robots into context and into culture where people would see Husqvarna robotics in a new emotional light.

Our strategy was to build an experience that does two things:

Give a sense of an improved product experience for existing owners by not just providing utility in the app but also something fun and emotional.

Get owners talking about their

ADDITIONAL BACKGROUND

Husqvarna has been leading in the field of robotic lawn mowers since their inception. But awareness is still low. Instead many associate Husqvarna with the orange pro-grade petrol-driven garden-power-tools that they’ve been making for decades.

Husqvarna’s robotic lawn mowers are among the most expensive on the market, with their top-tier consumer grade installations costing upwards €7000.

EXECUTION

Two weeks before Curiosity’s birthday we initiated the PR outreach to targeted outlets announcing the new software update. This was accompanied by press images and a launch video that was widely spread by both news outlets and in social media.

All Husqvarna robotic lawn mowers are set up and controlled via the same mobile app, Husqvarna Automower Connect which is available on all mobile platforms. The software update was released as a new feature in the app, where owners had the ability to opt in to the global choir.

Owners of Husqvarna Automowers then received a notification in their Automower Connect Apps, asking if they wanted their robotic lawn mowers to sing on August 5th. This was all the user had to do. If they chose to opt in, the Automower took care of the rest and sang at 12PM, 3PM and 6PM.

Earned Reach: 210 Million

Increase in brand expose: 1100%

Earned coverage in 26 markets.

Top trending story on reddit boards: r/gadgets & r/tech

Launch film was viewed 8.2 Million times across Youtube, Facebook and Instagram.

Video completion rate 70%, meaning that 70% of everyone who started the 90 second launch film, finished it.

Which is well above benchmark for a video of 90 seconds.

Average rates are 50% for YouTube, 5–10% for Facebook and 20,5% for instagram.

Total Hours of launch video content viewed 77,000

Increase in visitation to Husqvarna.com 300%

Increase in time spent on Husqvarna.com 250%

Overwhelmingly positive and emotional response in social media.

The 'Sing Birthday'-functionality has now become a permanent feature in Husqvarna's robotic lawn mowers and in the Automower Connect App. Now any birthday can have its own Birthday Singing robot.