Manifesto & Chatroulette
The brief:
Put French Connection back on the male radar, improve brand perception and increase menswear sales.
Poke’s answer:
We carved out men-only spaces for French Connection, starting by bisecting their website and existing digital channels by gender. Then we launched MANIFESTO, a blog dedicated to indulging modern manliness in a way that would get boys of all ages talking.
Nitty gritty
First we established some important manly foundations, developing UX and designs to create separate spaces (website, blog, newsletter, Twitter and Facebook) for man talk. We played up the editorial component on the website to add an emotional angle that would increase product relevance.
In order to hook as many men as possible (even those not interested in talking about fashion) we created the MANIFESTO blog and injected it with manly lifestyle and satiric content; interviews, clothing ‘test-drives’ and interactive initiatives.
During the process, Chat Roulette – a site that randomly connected people to one another by webcam – took the web by storm. We challenged our readers to find a real woman in the depths of this seedy chatroom and seduce her, screen-grabbing the evidence. The winner earned themselves a £250 voucher to get suited and booted for real-life seduction. We were the first brand to take advantage of the Chat Roulette hype and it earned French Connection huge amounts of buzz and male engagement. The menswear was regularly woven into these conversations.
Highlights
- Helping to meet sales objectives through creative & media innovation.
- Achieving A-list blog coverage (including Perez Hilton) without paying a penny.
- Interviewing butchers, heavy metal dudes and bare-knuckle fighters.
- Sparking Chat Roulette marriage proposals and original ukulele songs.
- Getting amusing requests from followers asking us to sponsor their own seduction experiments.
- Being the first to capitalise on the Chat Roulette trend.
