Our growing drive for the perfect life is a real modern-day problem, and so demands a modern-day approach. Which is why SIRE launched the fake image consultancy The Good Life Agency (TGLA), a social experiment to see how far people go to get the perfect image. It offered services to make your life look better than it is such as a ‘spontaneous’ meet up with a celebrity, extra likes on your Facebook post, or a fake one night stand, including photos and a WhatsApp chat. Anything to make your life look perfect.

TGLA was set up and launched as a legitimate company with a prominent Dutch communication professional as convincing founder, Chamber of Commerce registration, website hosting, promotional clips, press films, etc. To promote the agency, we chose to make a strongly polarised promotional film in which the services are exaggeratedly offered – and so get a real discussion going.

12 December, 3 pm: launch

The reports by the media partners (TV station, radio, magazine) about TGLA were immediately taken on by other media and influencers. On launch day, TGLA social media accounts started following Dutch journalists and celebrities. This helped enormously as they all posted about the agency. And thanks to the very polarised film, TGLA quickly became the talk of the town.

15 December, 10.30 pm: themed programme

Three days after the launch, the number 1 talk show in the Netherlands broadcast a specially themed episode disclosing SIRE as being behind TGLA. It was immediately trending topic on twitter.

15 December, 11.15 pm: revelation

A press release published straight after the revelation attracted even more attention to the subject. In less than a week, we had reached practically all of the Netherlands – and without even having a budget, we’d put the subject in the limelight.

Straight after the launch of TGLA, a national discussion broke out on social media. About 1/3 of the posts were indignant or surprised, 1/3 were doubtful (was it real?), and as many as 1/3 were actually interested and enthusiastic about the services (source: Monalyse). Within three days, the TGLA website had been visited more than 100,000 times and nearly 400 registrations made for the services.

There was huge publicity in the press with as many as 80 items in the national press. The revelation that SIRE was behind TGLA was immediately a trending topic on twitter. In less than a week, we’d generated 33.5 million impressions (without a budget, and in a country with just 17 million people). Research showed that Dutch people were significantly more aware of their drive to a perfect live after the campaign (+14%, source: DVJ insights). And were willing to change their behaviour, by letting their social environment know their weak spots (+20 significant increase). So in no time at all, we’d put this underemphasized subject in the limelight. Exactly as SIRE had hoped.