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The lure of gaming for brands is proving to be great for a range of brands around the world, with probiotic yogurt brand Actimel the latest to seize an opportunity to engage with players on Epic Game’s mutiplayer battle royale Fortnite.
The Danone-owned fermented milk drink, which promises consumers it will support their immune system, is now promising to heighten the immunity of avatars within the game with a small, bottled potion that resembles Actimel’s real-life packaging.
Within Fortnite, players can reinforce their defenses in the game when their avatars consume the potion, with the similarity to Actimel’s bottle proving a starting point for the activation, titled “The Immunity Station by Actimel.”
The idea was conceived by Wunderman Thompson France, who worked with Apfel, the developer of one of the game’s most popular maps, Zombie Hunter, to design a giant spaceship that crashed next to the Actimel Immunity Station on the map. The branded ship’s mission is to give players a little help when facing the enemy with an extra 30-second immunity boost while fighting a horde of zombies.
This isn’t the first foray by the brand into gaming, having previously launched Team Actimel, a 3D battle app that used augmented reality to allow users to fight their opponents. That was followed by a kid-focused app titled Actimel Team and the Animonzs. It has also sponsored gamers in the past, as well as which suits the brand that aims to engage with families, explained Benjamin Floch, marketing director for Dairy at Danone, to Adweek.
He added how Fortnite fit the younger target audience, as well as other players in their 20s-40s, admitting that children were not buying Actimel themselves.
Floch explained that the brand decided against creating anything new in Fortnite, instead choosing to adopt the established Zombie Hunter map with the aim to add to that experience. That led to a “bigger impact” as a result.
“We wanted to be part of what Fortnight was as a culture and a destination for the gamers,”Floch said.
Running until May 4, the aim is to drive awareness and reach of the brand while “rejuvenating” its message of self-protection too. Success will be measured across user exposure, and consumer perception post-activation alongside appreciation of the campaign and purchase intent too.
