Back in the day (say, oh, just two or three years ago), this was how a new product was introduced to a large audience:

A persuasive yet believable message was created by advertising agency. Message was dispersed through mass media. Mass media machine chugged along until it ran out of client’s dollars or over-exposed itself to every consumer. Consumer was inundated with the message enough to cry “Uncle!” and try the product to see what all the (pre-manufactured, mass-produced) hype was all about. If the consumer liked the product, they’d talk it up with their friends. If they didn’t, then, the opposite.

Fast-forward to today:

Consumers create content about products on an ever-increasing scale. Media is less and less “mass.” Consumer is the medium. Clients’ dollars need to go the distance and, somehow, keep going. Word of mouth is word of keyboard. Still, a great product is worth talking about.

Our McDonald’s team recently proved all of the above to be true through an interweaving of digital technology, consumer-as-medium, outdoor, online, mobile and on-site. How?

A few weeks back, through well-placed billboards, Kansas City was told to prepare for Angus.

Angus teaser outdoor board--Before.

Angus reveal outdoor board--After.

Then, as the new Angus Third Pounders hit the grill, we continued to use traditional outdoor boards to further the launch, two words at a time.

For most agencies, this is where the story would end. But for our team, it was just the beginning.

Over the next month, people were encouraged to sing the burger’s praises by submitting a two-word slogan online at honorangus.com or by text on their mobile device. We called the initiative HONOR ANGUS.

Consumers experienced the burger, then visited the site...

...created their own headline honoring Angus...

Submissions were posted in the website’s gallery area.

...and joined the crowd. They could also vote for their favorites.

Then, on Thursday morning, September 24, all 13 digital billboards in Kansas City began to display the headlines written by Angus fans. The headlines, along with the names of their authors, cycled in 10-second increments during a 24-hour market-wide roadblock.

More than 6,000 slogans were submitted in all–the majority by unique visitors versus a small number of individual people making multiple submissions. This was achieved, in part, because word about the opportunity to have 10 seconds of fame spread quickly via social media.

And one of the most engaging things of all? The whole idea encouraged interaction with the brand AFTER purchase and trial.

This campaign was the first time that a brand has taken over all of Lamar Outdoor’s digitals in a market for a single day. Lamar used its year-old iSpot technology that relies on RSS feeds to “scrape” information from the Honor Angus website for broadcast on the billboards–it’s the same technology used to automatically send news headlines, sports scores and weather updates to digital billboards for other clients around the country.

Honor Angus made quite an impression, even outside of KC. Patrick Moorhead, director of emerging media for Razorfish says it better than I (through no prodding from B-R or our client, I might add):

“By essentially road blocking the market then inviting those that live in the market to develop the creative, McDonald’s has really capitalized on the place-based aspect of the inventory and the dynamic and measurable aspect of the digital signage. This is by far one of the coolest digital out-of-home executions I’ve seen for a mass brand.”

To see the billboards in time-lapse action, click below.

It all added up to a big day for Angus and the B-R team!

Are you Angus enough?

Big day!