The iconic slogan, Should’ve Gone to Specsavers (SGTS) was taken out of ATL advertising for the first time ever - meaning social was the perfect place for it to live while the business explored other creative concepts to justify WHY people should go to Specsavers.

However, on Twitter, the line is not always deployed with respect by the general public.

So, our brief was to take back ownership of ‘Should’ve gone to Specsavers’ on social media by driving earned conversation as a brand and engaging others using it to positive effect.

Objectives

Maintain brand love and positive sentiment

Engage new and existing customers

Gain kudos with a wider audience of Twitter comedy and sports fans

Showcase Specsavers’ warm, knowledgeable and down-to-earth tone of voice

Not just flash-in-the-pan viral tweets - an always-on team of social comedy writers and creatives, delivering a steady stream of social media fame and kudos.

The team uses SGTS and the brand’s hallmark warm, knowledgeable and down-to-earth tone of voice to create a multidimensional online persona. One that’s funny, surprisingly warm and always at the forefront when something relevant is happening in the world or on social media..

They use this voice to own relatable sight and hearing mishaps, becoming the authority on moments that make us question our senses. It’s not about poking fun at those in trouble; it’s about showing them that these things happen to the best of us. Whenever somebody makes a comedic blunder, we’re there to put our arm around them and celebrate the art of being human.

An approach that works for us, again and again.

The Creative Reactive team provides an always-on, real-time creative response to opportunities presented without prior warning. It seeks out potential opportunities and produces lightning-quick, on-brand content, with often headline-grabbing results. For Specsavers, the approach works using a formula:

Relevant opportunity + relevant brand angle + tone of voice = opportunity

The focus was engaging those most likely to share and engage in humorous brand content. Live sport provided a huge opportunity, but we targeted a broad, cross-demographic audience, looking in all corners of pop culture.

In-the-moment humour and reactive commentary is one of Twitter’s stand-out USPs, but for healthcare brands like Specsavers, it can come across as hollow if this isn’t backed up with relevant content and significant brand warmth. Alongside wider campaign content, real time reactive worked perfectly on Twitter. Additionally, top-performing tweets were shared on Facebook, reaching 1.7m and showing that organic reach is by no means dead.

Our creative reactive team is online all day, 7 days a week, using social listening software to respond to breaking news and tweets just as they’re exploding in popularity. Quick thinking turns into on-brand content that’s instantly relatable and adds value, making real-time events ownable for Specsavers.

Questionable footballing decision? We offered “free tests for Premier League Defenders from Monday.” 4.3m impressions, 83k engagements. Lots of impressed football fans.

Marcus Rashford posting about being in the 20/20 club? We welcomed him. 1.9m impressions and 13.4k engagements for one reply.

Weetabix put beans on their cereal for some reason? We put beans on some glasses and stole the show - our most-seen reactive tweet in a sea of highly seen reactive tweets. 15.3m impressions, 58.5k engagements.

Our strong and consistent approach to reactive has produced strong and consistent results, with “the big ones” backed up by a steady hum of engagement.

13 tweets with 1 million+ impressions

54 tweets with 100k+ impressions

9 tweets with 10k+ engagements

49 tweets with 1k+ engagements

We are no stranger to praise ranging from “give the admin a raise” to “best admin on Twitter” and even “give this admin a knighthood.”

Total Real-Time Reactive Posts (10 months, all organic)

42,019,052 Impressions

3,053,555 Interactions

494,832 Engagements

34% increase in positive sentiment

1.7m people reached and 21.7k engagements by cross-posting on Facebook

To achieve the total figures recorded from our top 23 reactives on Twitter, total costs per metric would be:

28 Million impressions for £85.7k

2.1 Million interactions for £100.2k

324.9K Engagements for £279.5k