Every year, more than 6 million conversations about pasta and sauces take place online. And if people talk online about Barilla products, the best way to unveil hidden barriers and find the right levers to communicate with “Rejectors” is listening to what they say. Through our web listening room we set up a huge project aimed at validating consumers behaviour identified by Barilla marketing analysis and digitally identify brand-averse users. So we built behavioural prospect audiences based on social data and then we customized creative messaging to solve their barriers towards the brand. Following this approach, we found out that transparency and credibility were the key levers to work on to convert sceptic users: a famous and credible testimonial should walk Rejectors down the production chain and let them see through their eyes what the origins of grain are, how the best tomatoes for sauces are selected and how quality control happens.

In Italy pasta consumption is still very high (99.5% of Italian families buy pasta at least once a year) and Barilla has no troubles in terms of awareness. However, pasta and ready sauces consumption is decreasing among some slices of the population in favor of organic products or fresh food. In Italy about 22% of families do not buy Barilla, but the sauces context is even more complex and about 38% of families do not buy ready sauces because they prefer other (fresher) products. For this reason, we wanted to specifically identify these groups of Rejectors to be able to direct them a brand equity message to act on some brand indicators. Research revealed that barriers to the consumption of Barilla pasta and sauces were much more complex and multifaceted than what expected by the company. In particular, disappointing experiences with the brand, lack of proper information or feedbacks from other users were all different reasons to keep away a source of demand yet really important to meet sales objectives. Leveraging social insights and big data to understand consumers and inform them with the right

creative messages is the starting point for bringing them back, even the hardest ones...

About 9 million Rejectors of Barilla were exposed to the online video campaign, interacted with site contents, and walked through the fields with Bebe Vio. A survey showed that users exposed to the campaign were light or nonusers of Barilla pasta and sauces, meaning that audience building in DMP using the right keywords made it possible to identify and activate the true Rejectors at a more efficient cost.

The actions taken in 2017 have brought excellent results in terms of brand image and intention to buy: the relevant storytelling actually led Rejectors to change their mind: intention to buy after campaign exposure increased +14pt, together with an increase in perceived brand quality +19pt and transparency +18pt.