HENNESSY
Hennessy ran age-gated augmented reality ads on Instagram and Facebook to boost awareness of its association with Hip Hop and celebrate the music genre’s 50th anniversary, and saw a 7-point lift in ad recall.
For over 250 years, Hennessy has crafted cognacs in the Charente region of France. Hennessy’s cognacs are also used as ingredients in cocktails and mixed drinks and can be found at your local spirits stores, bars, restaurants, nightclubs, and more.
lift in ad recall
lift in message association (“Which brand do you associate most with the 50th anniversary of Hip Hop?”)
lift in purchase consideration
Hennessy wanted a way to increase consumer awareness of Hennessy's long association with Hip Hop and to celebrate the music genre’s 50th anniversary.
THE SOLUTION
Age-gated augmented reality ads
Hennessy has long been associated with Hip Hop, so in honor of Hip Hop’s 50th anniversary, Hennessy wanted to recognize the celebratory moment with a special ad campaign. The brand chose to run augmented reality (AR) ads to engage consumers with a new interactive digital experience that paid homage to the music genre and its relationship with the Hennessy brand. Hennessy also chose to use age-gated augmented reality ads, which enable advertisers to verify that the filter is only viewed by people above the legal drinking age.
Hennessy’s media agency of record, Publicis Media Luxe, collaborated with the team at Meta for the planning and media strategy for the campaign, and Hennessy worked with the production company Simone—a Meta Business Partner—to produce the augmented reality ads and filter effects in consultation with the team at Meta.
The AR ad creative highlighted key moments throughout the 50 years of Hip Hop, which originated in the Bronx borough of New York City in the 1970s. The name refers to a complex culture comprised of many elements, including: Deejaying (or turntabling), rapping (known MCing or rhyming), graffiti painting (known as graf or writing) and B-boying (which encompasses hip-hop dance, style and attitude).
The ads featured text overlays that encouraged viewers to “Discover iconic objects and interact with them in AR. Tap below to try now and share with your friends.” The ads included Click to interact and Try in Camera buttons that, when clicked, opened the camera on the viewer’s mobile device and loaded the AR effects.
The AR filter effects then provided an immersive world view where people could see the very street corner in the Bronx where the genre was born, and important objects such as boomboxes, turntables, records and so on. Hennessy delivered the ads to US adults aged 21 and over in Feed and Stories on Instagram and Facebook, as well as Instagram Reels.
Hennessy measured the results of its August 18–27, 2023 augmented reality ad campaign using a Meta brand lift study, which revealed:
- 3.5-point lift in message association (“Which brand do you associate most with the 50th anniversary of Hip Hop?”)
- 2.6-point lift in purchase consideration
- 7-point lift in ad recall