The marketing efforts during live sports is usually pretty standard: some OOH ads throughout the stadium, maybe some branding on player jerseys (depending on what sport you’re watching), sponsored replays of exciting moments.

You don’t often see deviations from these ad channels. So when brands do buck tradition during live sports, it can turn a lot of heads. And when they do it in a way that gives you the creeps, it’s even more memorable. 

This week, Case Studied explores how Paramount marketed their new movie with a very creepy, organic approach. 

The Brief:

In the months leading up to the release of the film SMILE, the Paramount marketing team was tasked with creating a “viral social stunt that would help put the film on the map,” said Danielle Kupchak, the EVP of Global Creative Content at Paramount Pictures. 

“During the brainstorm, my three-year-old saw a poster with one of the stars smiling super creepily, and one day she turned to me slowly with a creepy smile. It was so chilling that I knew at that moment we had to bring that creepy smile from the film to people’s everyday lives in a way that felt personal and unexpected,” Kupchak said. “I thought, ‘this is so scary because a smile is essentially like a global act of kindness and happiness.’”

Rather than planting scary, smiling actors on the street, Kupchak wanted to reach the masses in a way that made them actually experience the creepiness themselves. She also didn’t want it to feel like marketing—no “brought to you by” taglines or anything like that. 

Kupchak and her team decided that large public televised events were the best route to get there. The campaign was launching around the MLB playoff season during the summer of 2022, so the stadiums tended to be full and the folks watching on television were often watching in groups. It was the ideal combination for the execution.

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The Execution:

Paramount partnered with TriplePlay Studios to bring the SMILE campaign to life. It was a profoundly simple, affordable execution: they bought tickets to MLB and NFL games that were in camera view. These were big teams, in big markets, and they executed across multiple games in the same day. 

They sent actors to the games in bright neon shirts that were eye-catching to cameras. The shirts had the words, “SMILE” printed in clear, large letters. The actors smiled their best creepy smiles. And, most disturbingly, they kept those smiles the entire time they were at the games. 

“We felt like it was critical to do this over consecutive days, for multiple games in one night, so that it felt like it was happening everywhere and it couldn’t be missed,” Kupchak said. 

“Casting was obviously one of the most important parts,” she continued. “We needed actors to smile creepily for a whole game. They were obviously allowed to go to the bathroom but we wanted them to hold the smile throughout the process of standing up and walking away because we wanted people to say, “What the hell is happening?”

The Results:

Paramount wanted organic engagement and they got organic engagement. The smilers were everywhere across all social media and broader media in general. The campaign generated more than 160 million organic media views and 100 million media impressions in less than one week. 

It had over 170 million trackable views across all major social platforms. Thanks to its earned media coverage, the campaign reached an additional 100 million people. AdWeek named it one of the best ads of 2022 and the campaign was featured on CNN, TMZ, ESPN, USAToday, Sports Illustrated, and more. 

The organic engagement this campaign drew can best be emulated by Mr. Met getting involved in the shenanigans—see the progression here and here. 

SMILE became the number one movie at the box office with $30 million in ticket sales opening weekend. Altogether, the film ended up grossing over $216 million in ticket sales—on a $17 million production budget. 

The film’s director, Parker Finn, said he was worried that no one would notice the smilers in the crowd at first. By end of the campaign, he said “It was just happening organically and it was overwhelming how much that took off. It was just instantly everywhere. Kudos to them for their terrific idea.”

Not bad for only paying for the price of a normal game ticket.

The Takeaways:

This campaign gives us something to talk about and learn from. Here are a few takeaways from the SMILE promo.

1. Great marketing doesn’t need to be expensive

The magic of the Smile campaign is the simplicity, and that any brand likely has the resources to pull it off. Whether you are working with a shoestring budget or multi-millions, getting attention can be inexpensive if you have the right idea.

When ideating on ways to promote your products, thinking about generating eyeballs without spending a ton is a great way to come up with scrappy solutions that don’t break the bank.

2. Earned media is the north star

To the point above, to make impactful marketing without spending a fortunate on a media buy for things like TV spots or billboards, you need to be able to generate earned media (any material written about you or your business that you haven't paid for or created yourself) coverage.

While that is easier said than done, marketing that can capture human interest, especially in a social media dominant society, can benefit from being picked up and shared by both media sources and social accounts.

Before finalizing your marketing plans, it is vital to be self-critical and ask “what would make someone share this” or “why should someone care”, especially if your success is dependent on earned media.

3. Don’t overlook frequency

Yes, the volume of impressions of your campaign is important. The more people you can get in front of the better. The problem is, even if someone sees your ad, the likelihood of them being able to recall it or truly understand what your marketing is small.

That is why it’s important not to dismiss frequency as an important metric, to ensure that your target buyer is exposed to your ad multiple times. The brilliance of the Smile campaign is that these actors kept popping up at events, making them impossible to ignore.

Talk about memorable: Just like you won’t forget those creepy smiles, you won’t forget the experience of working with Vendry. They match you with vetted agency partners, for free, within 7 days or less. Simplify your agency search.