In 2012, Maurice Lacroix, the Swiss watchmaker, launched a new product, Pontos S, for divers.

Maurice Lacroix teamed up with the professional Swiss free-diver, Sébastian Murat, as he tried to break the free-diving world record in June in Southern France for two weeks, and ran a social media campaign.

The campaign objectives were

1) Generate buzz around the campaign in a social media space and

2) Establish its brand positioning 'Follow Your Conviction'.

The project was launched as a worldwide competition allowing consumers to get involved by calling for a team of bloggers to document Sébastien’s attempt in France.

10 applicants with the highest votes in each job category, including an English blogger, Chinese blogger, Russian Blogger, German Blogger, Wordpress expert, video blogger, personal assistant and pool boy were short listed.

The competition had a huge response with the official video receiving over 1.5 million views and the application videos over 7.6 million impressions from all over the world.

• Over 5 million fans reached via Facebook

• 131,311 unique visits on the microsite, THE-FRENCH-JOB.com

The campaign is highly appropriate because it worked, so to say, on its own and spread mainly by word of mouth and its social community.

In order to reach and engage with bloggers worldwide, we developed a film calling for a team of bloggers to document Sébastien’s attempt in France. We focused on seeding and spreading the film via online content distribution platforms targeting to young professional males and bloggers all over the world.

Furthermore, we added a twist to generate additional buzz via social media networking sites like Facebook. There were eight positions available, including an English blogger, Chinese blogger, Russian Blogger, German Blogger, Wordpress expert, video blogger, personal assistant and pool boy. Applicants had to not only get votes but also prove why they deserve the position they applied for because, in the selection process, 10 applicants with the highest numbers of votes in each category were short listed. Then, Maurice Lacroix reviewed their applications and information to determine if they qualify for executing the jobs.

Despite the fact Sébastian could not break the world record, the competition had a huge response with the official video receiving over 1.5m views and the application videos over 7.6m impressions from all over the world. The video was embedded by over 6,600 publishers and Maurice Lacroix benefited from earned media value of over CHF 7.5m.

Numbers in 7 weeks:

• 7,640,942 impressions on THE FRENCH JOB application videos

• 1,567,013 views on THE FRENCH JOB official videos

• Over 5m fans reached via Facebook

• 131,311 unique visits on the microsite, THE-FRENCH-JOB.com