Every year, Coca-Cola has a key date in which it needs to increase the incidence of consumption of the beverage in burger combos: Burger Week, a period when the brand gives many discounts on food deliveries. In May of 2023, we were tasked with increasing sales of Coca-Cola No Sugar on digital channels, amidst a competitive period for any food and beverage product. To stand out among the crowd, we had to come up with an idea that resonated with consumers' yearning for self-expression, having fun, and getting a reward in exchange for giving the brand their time and information.

Based on the insight that people come up with wild burger configurations all around the world, but the one thing that never changes is Coca-Cola being the perfect match for a burger, we thought: "What if consumers could turn the burger into a platform for self-expression, and get something back in return for their creativity?" Thus was born Surreal Burgers. The idea was to let people generate a burger with AI, in exchange for a real burger with Coca-Cola. They did this on a landing page, after answering a simple quiz with questions about personal tastes, and then got an instant discount on their combo via delivery. There were tens of thousands of surreal burgers generated, showcasing people's crazy imaginations, and proving that AI can be deliciously magical when we harness its potential together with human creativity.

Through our research, we found we had to engage Gen Z and Millennials who are disillusioned with current marketing tactics. Therefore, we had to come up with an idea that would break through the noise in a digital, shareable, and actionable way. We focused on two main groups: foodies (lovers of food) and power shoppers (those with strong purchasing habits). In terms of age group, we targeted those 18 and above, since we're talking a lot with a younger demographic.

In terms of media, our efforts were directed on AdsMovil, HYPR, DV360, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Twitch, and Adludio. These were chosen for their ability to engage and convert (our two main KPIs) on digital commerce. A huge boost to the campaign was collaborating with a top 10 Brazilian influencer, Casimiro. He's beloved by young people on YouTube, so we did a livestream with him on that channel and on Twitch.

Our campaign ran for around three weeks during Burger Week, focusing on a young audience on digital channels, boosted by engagement with TikTokers taste testing burgers, and a huge Brazilian influencer showing his livestream audience the various Surreal Burgers generated. This paid and organic media drove people to a McDonald's landing page, where they could fill out a very simple and fast quiz asking about their preferences in terms of favorite movie genre, musical style, zodiac sign, and McDonald's burger. This resulted in an awesome piece of art they could share on social media. People loved engaging on the page, generating their own, authentic Surreal Burgers — each crazier than the other. There were burgers with sunglasses, post-apocalyptic burgers, and even cute, underwater burgers. In the end, we proved that AI is a welcome friend in letting people express their creativity in exchange for something delicious and magical.

The results were surreal! Firstly, our audience loved interacting on the landing page to generate their crazy art pieces: People filled out over 40,000 forms on the site. In fact, McDonald's outperformed iFood (a popular Brazilian food app), even though the latter was more profitable. There were over 984,000 clicks and 81 million impressions on iFood alone. Attractiveness was 110% higher than expected, and the number of clicks was twice what we predicted. In terms of brand lift, people who saw our ads said later they'd choose Coca-Cola as their only soda brand when purchasing. This reinforced consideration.Finally, our big numbers were also surreal: 22 million impressions in one week, 415,000 clicks, 50,000 burgers generated, 383% increase in combo sales compared to last year, and a 276% greater-than-projected clickthrough rate. Simply magical.