The Challenge

In Brazil, soap operas have the highest ratings on TV, higher than any series. Even the most famous series struggle to have the same success. Truly speaking, those will never get even closer to a soap opera’s success. The objective was to make Investigation Discovery’s new series Deadly Affairs get into people’s lives that are soap opera lovers.

The Strategy

To launch a new TV series in a country that loves soap operas, we did one simple thing: transformed the campaign into a soap opera, even incorporating the traditional overacting seen in the soap operas. We created a love-triangle story inspired on the series and performed it live in the streets of São Paulo, Brazil’s largest city.

The scene was recorded on a single-shot by 7 different cameras and released as a YouTube video.

The Results:

Almost instantly, The Lover video became a PR hit. It made headlines in TV networks primetime news and had 460 mentions on the press in over 20 countries, resulting in $12 million of spontaneous media. Over 50 different versions of the video were made, achieving 980 million global impressions.

Most importantly, Investigation Discovery had 75% increases in ratings during the show’s premiere – an all-time record for Discovery Networks in Brazil.

We created a love-triangle story inspired on the series and performed it live in the streets of São Paulo, Brazil’s largest city.

The scene was recorded on a single-shot by 7 different cameras and released as a YouTube video, one week prior to the show’s premiere.

Almost instantly, The Lover live activation became hit. It made headlines on mass media publications during the whole week. Over 50 different versions of the video were made, achieving 980 million impressions, each one of them driving people directly to the show’s premiere date. It was made possible on the video’s last scene, and also with YouTube advertising, purchased on the videos that were recut.

Everything went better than the original plan could possibly be. So, on the show’s premiere day, The Lover video was also aired on Discovery Networks, as a last invitation to watch it.

Almost instantly, The Lover live activation became a hit. It made headlines in TV networks primetime news and had 460 mentions on the press in over 20 countries, resulting in $12 million of spontaneous media. Over 50 different versions of the video were made, achieving 980 million global impressions.

Most importantly, Investigation Discovery had 75% increases in ratings during the show’s premiere – an all-time record for Discovery Networks in Brazil.