Clients
Virgin Active
Sofa Bash
Virgin Active Health Clubs are one of the most well known fitness chains in the UK. Focussed on making the gym experience relaxed and not too serious, their marketing activity carries through this theme.Client Objective:
As part of their 2008 marketing strategy, Virgin Active wanted to get more potential customers coming into the gym by distributing free day passes within digital content that would entertain and engage their digital native audience.Agency Activity:
Our response to this brief was to create a digital stress toy based on a sofa that users could destroy within a 30 second time limit. Our creative team came up with a selection of weapons including ray guns and samurai swords to obliterate the sofa with. We wanted to give users a reason to play the game multiple times while creating an experience that they would want to share.Results:
Within the period that the game distributed the day pass voucher, Virgin Active saw a huge uptake in footfall and subsequent membership. Since then, the game has grown into one of the most successful viral games ever. It has now had 38 million plays from 26 million unique individuals. This statistic includes an incredible 1.05 million plays in the first week of launch.Despite the game only lasting 30 seconds, the average user will repeat play for over 4 minutes.
The campaign was a finalist in the 2009 NMA Effectiveness Awards for the “Best Use of Viral”.