The head pain market in Poland, and other markets where the campaign is to run, is a highly competitive category and growing, with more players entering the migraine sector.

OTC products can be advertised to the public with the following restrictions:

• Content using real-life suffers must include a disclaimer.

• User-generated content to be monitored on the page in which it’s hosted.

• HCPs, celebrities, public figures can’t appear in communication

• All advertising materials must include standardised legal - video materials to feature an 8” hold time title accompanied by VO, taking minimum 20% of the frame.

Virtual reality is often used to transport people into imaginary worlds, but never before has it been used to transport people into someone else’s head to experience symptoms through their eyes. Excedrin, the head pain medication, has become the first brand in its category to explore this.

One in five people suffer from migraine, but most people still think they’re ‘just a strong headache’. How could you understand what a migraine is like unless you’ve actually experienced one yourself? Excedrin wanted to help sufferers show the world how debilitating migraine can be.

We developed the world’s first migraine simulator using Oculus Rift. Combining the UK’s leading virtual reality developers with migraine sufferers, we built a custom-made rig that we then used to create an experiment and film, allowing friends, family and co-workers to see the world through the eyes of migraine sufferers.

We wanted to make the experiment as realistic as possible, so one of our biggest technical challenges was to overcome the inherent problem of virtual reality – ‘lag’. However, by building bespoke drivers that fed our video footage into the headset in real time, we were able to create the most authentic user experience possible.

Our goal was to create global digital content to raise awareness of migraine and strategically communicate Excedrin’s brand position as ‘the head pain expert’, the empathetic expert that truly understands migraine sufferers.

Our challenge was to build on the brand’s ‘through the eyes’ creative platform, a technique that uses first-person POV in Excedrin’s TV advertising, to demonstrate an understanding of the full range of migraine symptoms.

Although our prime audience are migraine sufferers (female, age 25yo+) our communication aimed to speak to a much wider audience with the goal to raise awareness amongst their friends, family and co-worker.

Understanding that every migraine is personal, we teamed real-life sufferers with VR developers to recreate migraine symptoms that mirrored the sufferers’ own experiences. Friends, family and co-workers of migraine sufferers who volunteered to be part of the experiment and were challenged to take on their partner’s migraine for just 30 minutes in a regular day.

The experiment was filmed and uploaded to the brand’s YouTube channel, with traffic driven to the videos using paid media including pre-rolls and display advertising, as well as a dedicated page on the brand’s website. The campaign launched in Poland on 24th April 2015 with a global rollout to follow later this year. The campaign will be live in Poland until 31st July.

Every volunteer that took part in the experiment said that the experience showed them how severe migraine really is and they felt better equipped to support the migraine sufferer.

Alongside this we surveyed a cross-section of 475 people who saw the finished video:

-89% of respondents said it increased their understanding of migraine. More surprisingly, 81% of migraine sufferers themselves said it increased their understanding too.

-93% of people felt more sympathetic to migraine sufferers after watching the video and 63% of migraine sufferers said the video made them more likely to recommend Excedrin to another migraine sufferer.

In the first 2 weeks following launch in Poland, the campaign reached 1.6 million people. The experiment was so successful Excedrin is streamlining the technology to be used at press launches and trade shows. Excedrin also plans to take the kit on the road, allowing the public to experience it for themselves.

With the campaign living exclusively online, we decided to take a very different approach to Excedrin’s above-the-line strategy and adapt the brand’s tone-of-voice. Our aim was to create and a truly authentic and honest piece of communication that sufferers would feel they were understood and would want to share.

Unlike the brand’s competitors, Excedrin always aims to demonstrate empathy towards migraine sufferers, showing their unique understanding what it’s like ‘through their eyes’. We needed to translate this to work in a digital space.

As ‘The Head Pain’ experts, we have successfully embraced and customised new technology to create a much-needed tool that now, for the first time ever, helps sufferers show the world what they actually go through.

Not only has it helped sufferers, the new technology has allowed Excedrin to communicate a distinctive and ownable message that proves they truly understand migraine sufferers.