Affinity, a leading pet food brand, has just launched Comunimals, its new online community for pets and their owners.

Our goal is to create awareness about the launch of the new website and drive web traffic and registrations on the new website. The awareness should rise on specialised media and VIP blogs, forums which are already creating contents about cats and dogs, but also on mass media so anyone owning a pet could learn from our new launch. All this must be done with a highly effective low cost campaign because there is no traditional media ad spending involved.

So we sent out a press release to awaken the interest of journalists, bloggers and above all, their pets: The Pet Food Release. Developed using Affinity pet food. 100% edible for cats and dogs.

The pet food release was accompanied by a viral video showing the production process and interest among pets.

The campaign has great results in terms of number of media creating buzz about the campaign, media coverage and web traffic to the new website.

All started with just an innovative press release addressed to key opinion leaders, making a clear statement on how PR could work to drive digital results.

We were running on a low budget to spread the launch of Comunimals and get the media involved. Had we sent the usual press release we would have been just one more among so many others. With the idea of a low budget in mind, we thought of a flat mailing that would pass as a press release without being one. And not just that, the execution should communicate itself the product we wanted to announce. We mixed the journalists’ world (with the press release) with the animals’ world (with the pet food) to create the Pet Food Release.

We selected from the database based on the basic principles for cats and dogs.

We made 300 press releases from pet food, personalised with the pet’s real name.

190 for dogs and 110 for cats.

A making-of of the creative process was made.

The press release was published on 190 general media, all specialized media and 80 blogs.

The effect achieved through the media amounted to 250,000€. based on an investment of under 25,000€.