What Happened
State Farm has partnered with on-demand courier service Postmates and Chili’s to capitalize on the “housegating” trend among football fans for its latest digital campaign. On Nov. 27, the first 5,000 people ordered a special “Cali BBQ’ritos” from Chili’s on Postmates got the item delivered to their doorsteps for free. The offer was available to residents in nine markets in the South and Southwest regions, including Phoenix, San Diego, Dallas, Houston, Denver, and Los Angeles. To promote this initiative, State Farm rolled out Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter ads on Saturday to target the NFL fans.
What Brands Should Do
This new campaign from State Farm and Chili’s continues an ongoing trend of brands teaming up with on-demand delivery services to reach potential customers with products or branded experiences. Most recently, IKEA partnered with Uber to send free meal-planning kits to lucky customers in NYC as part of its Thanksgiving campaign. As more and more consumers start to actively avoid traditional advertising with the help of ad-blockers and ad-free subscription services, brands need to preemptively branch out and explore non-conventional marketing channels to reach customers.
Source: AdWeek