In Spring 2020, KFC was heavily impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic. In the UK, its restaurants were temporarily closed - then on reopening, KFC fans faced a limited menu.

We were briefed by KFC to engage and entertain gamers. Given the Covid-19 challenges, any activity needed to be inherently digital, sharable and authentic.

The KFC Gaming channels, set up by Kairos in 2018, provided a springboard

The objectives were threefold: earn mass reach, foster positive engagement and drive closer KFC affinity to gaming.

The creative concept was the KFConsole - a new, next-gen gaming console from the fried chicken brand, which didn’t just allow for gameplay, but also for chicken to be cooked within it.

The KFConsole had to look and feel the part; gamers are highly critical of brands looking to capitalize on their community, our authenticity would mean everything.

With 4k, 120fps gameplay and cross platform compatibility, the console also integrated the KFC brand and product, taking the shape of a KFC bucket and even including a Chicken Chamber, to heat your favourite KFC menu item.

Mirroring the tactics we knew would be deployed by Xbox and Playstation (to support their new next-gen consoles), the way the console was launched was as important to the campaign as the hardware itself.

Kairos knew that the upcoming reveal of new next gen consoles would trigger significant conversation among gamers globally. But we didn’t want to enter this conversation, we wanted to lead it. So, we took a strategic decision to reveal the KFConsole in a 24-hour window post the “first look” of Sony’s PlayStation 5.

Similarly, we knew the timelines for Sony and Microsoft’s launches beyond the summer reveal events, and mirrored them with the KFConsole to ensure it remained a core part of the console wars narrative in the run down to the fall 2020 launches.

Gamers are notoriously active and opinionated online. We knew that we could leverage these tendencies with appropriately toned and timed content to take the KFConsole far beyond our owned KFC gaming pages.

To capture the attention of gamers en masse, the KFConsole was tactically revealed just hours after the Playstation 5 launch event in June. The reveal took the form of a slick, CGI film, which was launched on KFC Gaming’s Twitter, Instagram and YouTube channels.

Between the reveal in June and launch in December, KFC Gaming capitalised on the debate amongst gamers around whether the KFConsole was real or not with a series of cryptic social posts. True to next-gen console form, Kairos even factored in ‘delays’ to the launch schedule to tantalise gamers even more.

For the launch in December, once again KFC tailgated behind Microsoft and Sony with its announcement film, utilising its burgeoning KFC Gaming social channels to host the content before it once again took a hold within gaming communities and beyond.

On KFC’s owned social channels, the KFConsole delivered:

35.1 million+ organic impressions

4 million+ engagements

84,000 new followers

Overall 26.9% engagement rate

Across other social & digital platforms it achieved:

238m potential impressions across Twitter

18k Reddit mentions

8.5 million Google searches for ‘KFConsole or KFC Console’ globally

In terms of earned media it achieved:

Over 2,500 media articles globally including coverage in publications such as BBC News, FOX News, USA Today, Daily Mail, IGN, Daily Express, TechRadar, Metro and The Independent. Coverage equated to a media value of £14.8m with a total reach of 3.1 bn.

Overall, The KFConsole nailed its objective of delivering mass awareness and positive sentiment amongst a usually fickle gaming audience, plus it established KFC not just as a brand for gamers, but as a gaming brand in its own right.