Spring 2015 in North America was especially cold. As a warm-weather tourist destination, we wanted to invite people to go to Mexico to get away from the low temperatures. By using the much-hated snow to create compelling messages, we hit a nerve with an upset target. The goal was to bring visibility and differentiation to this destination and increase website traffic and bookings.

Besides the positive live reactions during the creation process, the resulting video and pictures were seen in over 29 countries, generating a potential reach of 50 million impressions in only 15 days. Two additional sponsored Facebook posts generated more than 1 million views and 20K+ interactions across social media channels.

Web and business results were strong too: +100% traffic to client’s social media channels, +30% traffic to client’s website, +30% information requests vs. daily average, and +200% information requests from social media vs. daily average.

Considering that production budget and media investment were extremely limited, the ROI was fully positive.

We scouted for the highest-traffic areas in Chicago that had the appropriate surfaces needed for our positive snow messages to stick and be brought to life. We used 2 highly-visible city walls, near a college campus and a downtown station, and a large-scale rooftop in the commercial heart of the city to maximize the campaign’s reach.

Our potential visitors were sick of the cold. Although they thought of Mexico as a warm and close destination, they were not considering it as an obvious getaway. Our strategy was to propose this escapade at the right moment and through the right channel: using the snow everyone was complaining about as our medium.