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The Applegreen marketing team wanted to make a splash for their Applegreen 24/7 birthday by giving back to their loyal customers with an eye-catching offer. The big day took place immediately after the easing of restrictions and Applegreen knew the nation craved a lift after the challenges of the previous months.

As Applegreen’s newly appointed PR / Communications agency, and with a lead-time of a little over two weeks, Cullen Communications was tasked with developing all social media content and generating excitement through an intense integrated influencer and media relations programme.

All activity focussed on delivering widespread earned and social media coverage for the birthday date of 24/7.

Applegreen had amazing in-store offers but the key offer to highlight for earned PR was the 24.7cent fuel sale across 24 selected stores nationwide. A fuel sale of this value was a first for any Irish brand and offered an excellent opportunity to create a very tactical campaign.

It was equally important to manage any potential negativity caused by potential traffic congestion, therefore as communications advisors, we had to ensure that all fuel sale announcements were strategically timed to mitigate this risk.

The success of the activity hinged on the surprise stunt element, and it was agreed to gift bespoke media party boxes in advance to generate social sharing and talkability in advance. The boxes were packed with goodies and included a cryptic note highlighting that there would be a BIG surprise on 24/7.

The agency also engaged with high profile influencers to help build excitement through their owned channels in advance of and on 24/7 by visiting a number of Applegreen’s. Cullen Communications worked closely with the Applegreen social media team to develop birthday competition mechanics for social and to generate content to build excitement for the 24/7 celebrations and the fuel sale reveal across all owned and shared platforms.

To soften the commercial component of the campaign and to assist with earned PR coverage, we pitched an interesting business angle to business media focussing on the Applegreen success story, marking 28 years in business in Ireland. On top of this, the agency crafted a press release to share on the birthday date, in advance of all key morning news shows, and followed up with key detail on the fuel sale locations each hour throughout the day.

The strategy consisted of an intense two-week campaign including, planning, preparation and execution on the day:

This short, sharp stunt campaign reached an audience of over 20 million through online and print media coverage on the day of the 24/7 celebrations and in regional print media afterwards – this reach was generated through earned media coverage, influencer activity and social media mentions/shares.

To build excitement and reveal this record-breaking fuel sale offer, we secured a high-profile radio interview on RTE Morning Ireland business slot, which included key messing on company success, the significance of the birthday milestone and concluded with information on the sale offer including the announcement of the first site sale reveal at the time of interview.  

The overall retail sales in Applegreen with customers availing of the special birthday offers was up 33.5% versus the 2019 birthday campaign. This included an overall increase in footfall to Applegreen outlets nationwide of 7.4% on 24th July. 

To generate excitement online and to increase the duration of the birthday celebrations the Applegreen social media competitions delivered a significant lift in engagement from existing and new followers from 20th – 24th July. In fact, the consumer competitions and fresh content relating to the 24/7 celebration amassed a lift of 70,000 new followers on Facebook and Instagram channels in advance of 24/7 alone (65k Facebook and 5k Instagram).

The TikTok style pass the parcel social content, the happy birthday messages from staff and the individualised fuel sale reveal content managed by the Cullen’s team ensured that all Applegreen social platforms had fresh, engaging content in the lead up to the birthday and throughout 24/7. These social videos amassed a total of 57,128 video through plays.

The influencer collaborations throughout the day delivered positive engagements and amassed a collective impression rate of over 200,000 between our three influencers. This demonstrated that the excitement generated by the influencer engagements helped to maintain engagement and attention online throughout the day.

Influencer PR at Kildare and Cork with Anna Geary and Brian Dowling also delivered earned PR coverage in local titles and online after the fuel sale event including four regional titles that carried imagery and mentions of the Applegreen stunt activity.

The 2020 Continental Tyres Irish Car of the Year (ICOTY) awards campaign was launched in January 2019, with the arrival on the market of the first batch of new car models. All new cars and vans launched in Ireland during the calendar year are eligible for the awards, across a range of categories that includes compact, medium and large cars, compact, medium and large SUVs, luxury cars and ‘hot hatchbacks’, MPVs and cars with particular environmental credentials. All new vehicles are tested throughout the year by the ICOTY jury, made up of a panel of the most experienced motoring journalists in Ireland. The jury nominates a shortlist of contenders which go on to contest the category prizes as well as the overall award – the title of Irish Car of the Year.

As PR agency to the Continental Tyres-sponsored awards programme, the main job of Cullen Communications is to keep the spotlight on the awards throughout the year, then create as big a splash as possible around the gala awards event which takes place in November. Our target audience includes all members of the motoring public – especially people looking at or thinking about buying a new car – and anyone with an interest in the automotive market. The awards are not just about ‘new metal’ – they also serve to highlight emerging trends and important breakthroughs in car safety technology and environmental compliance: both important messages to include in our communications strategy.

Of course, the starting point for anyone considering buying a new car is the internet. Almost 90% of all car shoppers spend some time doing online research, so anyone interested in connecting with this target audience must have a website that is quick, relevant, responsive and easy to navigate. At the beginning of the 2020 ICOTY awards, we decided to invest in a new website (replacing the existing site) that would promote the awards, explain the entry criteria and judging process, showcase past winners and provide visitors with news and updates from the world of motoring. 

www.caroftheyear.ie

In tandem with our online efforts, our strategy would also include the valuable and often unseen ‘spade work’ associated with the awards, including liaising with the judging panel and ICOTY committee as they worked their way through new car drives and assessments, while keeping our client Continental Tyres updated – and of course preparing for the much-anticipated awards event in November… lots to do!

Almost immediately the new website was live, it was time to start posting fresh, original content that would attract the interest of new car browers/enthusiasts while also providing a signpost to the upcoming awards. We launched a new ‘Ones to watch’ series of new car reviews and video blogs, giving visitors an early taste of which models were out there and which ones were possibly likely to figure in the awards shake-up. Each OTW post featured two or three new cars, with accompanying imagery and product specification to provide a rounded, comprehensive view.

As the year went on, we worked closely with the ICOTY committee to ensure all journalists eligible to vote had had an opportunity to drive the contenders. This process ramped up a notch in the month of October – shortly after the jury had announced its shortlist for the 2020 awards – when we hosted our annual refresher drive day, bringing all members of the judging panel to Mondello Park where they could drive any and all of the shortlisted models and remind themselves of each one’s unique qualities.

With excitement mounting, we were also in daily contact with our awards venue: the upmarket Westin Hotel in the heart of Dublin city centre. With all the key players in Ireland’s automotive industry expected to attend, we had to put on an event that would inspire, entertain, and live up to the awards’ well-earned reputation as the highlight of the motoring calendar. Each piece of the jigsaw – branding, entertainment, light and sound, choice of MC, menu, winner reveal – involved three-way liaison between ourselves, as PR agency (event managers), our client Continental (sponsor) and the ICOTY committee which owns the awards scheme.

As the countdown began in earnest, we ramped up our PR communications strategy, both traditional and digital, to spread the word that the ICOTY awards were just around the corner. Managing the guest list and invitation strategy, we ensured ‘everyone who was anyone’ from the automotive world would be in attendance. And with speed likely to be of the essence on the night itself, we generated a series of announcement templates to ensure the big news would be up in lights, live and direct from the awards venue.

The 2020 Continental Tyres Irish Car of the Year awards were, in the words of one guest, “hands down the best ever”. A packed Westin Hotel stood witness to the unveiling of Ireland’s best car of the year: the Kia eSoul, which also won the Green/Efficient Car of the Year and Compact Car of the Year categories – a magnificent hat-trick for Kia Ireland.

Representing the 34-strong ICOTY jury, Anthony Conlon congratulated Kia on a worthy win, adding: “I am sure the Irish Car of the Year title will be a huge boost for the e-Soul during the busy January sales period”. His fellow committee member Bob Flavin noted that the e-Soul was the first electric car to win Ireland’s overall accolade. “Regardless of its fuel type, the e-Soul was the clear winner and was hugely popular with my motoring journalist colleagues,” he said.

On the PR side, the ICOTY awards generated widespread coverage across national print, online and broadcast media as well as trade and specialist publications. The website,  which we had updated live on the night, generated more than 7,000 page views leading up to awards night – a creditable return given the niche nature of the awards. The 2021 awards have now begun with more new cars and vans arriving on the market, and we look forward to another successful awards programme.

Mobility solutions specialist, easytrip, Ireland’s only electronic parking and tolling tag provider, have been a client of Cullen Communications since 2013. easytrip offer a range of services with the use of the easytrip tag including easyParking, easyWash and tolling as well as easyAssist and Puncture Protect.

Launched in July 2018, easyWash is a fantastic new service from easytrip that allows motorist to ‘wash and go’ with the use of the easytrip tag with no need to go into the service station to get a ticket or enter a code to wash their car. 

Cullen Communications worked with easytrip and its partner Maxol to launch the new service to the Irish public and specifically to Irish motoring and trade media as a PR announcement.  A unique focus for the announcement was to cover how the new easytrip service complemented Ireland’s growing cashless society highlighting the benefits it offered to Irish motorists.

We created an informative media release in collaboration with easytrip and Maxol that detailed the new partnership, the benefits of the new service offering including key messaging and quotes from spokespersons.

A key element to the announcement was the photography to accompany the press release to ensure maximum media coverage.  Cullen Communications arranged for a professional PR photographer to work on the announcement to capture the photography.  For this we discussed various creative concepts with our photographer and arranged for it to take place at a new Maxol service station maxWash car wash with the CEO of both companies. 

Once all PR material was complete and approved Cullen Communications handled the media relations in issuing the press release to relevant motoring media and key contacts to maximise PR coverage for the announcement. Media outlets were then monitored in the following days to track mentions and levels of coverage and a report was collated for easytrip.

As the first service of its kind in Ireland it really got people talking.

The announcement generated over 70 brand mentions with a reach of 20.1 million across print and online covering targeted motoring columns, news desks and automotive trade publications.

The service is currently available at 17 Maxol sites with more sites to be announced.

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