Creating a deeper connection with pet parents

Through digital listening in combination with our 360 insights tool, we tapped into pet parent conversation. This community has a strong emotional connection to their pets. They’re committed to making a new pet part of the family, spending significantly on pet comforts and setting up pet profiles on social. We discovered a lot of mutual support too – pet parents are actively sharing and asking for best care routines for their pets.

A pet’s health and happiness are so important to pet parents. Our audience wants to make the right decisions, but there so many options and a cluttered sector. Insights also tell us pet parents don’t always routinely treat against fleas and ticks – often only doing so when they spot signs of these parasites.

We identified that by supporting pet parents and positioning FRONTLINE® as part of their community, FRONTLINE® could help pet parents to make effective choices about pet health.

A TV campaign, supported by digital and print activity, were selected as mediums. TV is a key channel to drive awareness and brand perception. And as FRONTLINE® has the credibility and proven efficacy to be the instinctive ‘go-to’ choice for pet parents, we needed to convey this in the creative execution.

We created a TV commercial that celebrates the reciprocal pet and pet parent relationship in a way that resonates with our audience. By bringing to life this instinctive shared love and support, we positioned FRONTLINE® as a brand that truly understands what it is to be a pet parent. And focus groups were run with pet parents across the country in the pre-production phase to discover what resonated most so we could refine our script to make the strongest emotional and educational content.

As well as the 30-second TVC, we created 20, 10 and 6 second edits for YouTube pre-roll and VOD, plus captured static imagery from the shoot to use within digital advertising and on print items.

The TV campaign ran from April to June – a key purchase period for the product.

This TVC was initially developed to connect with UK pet parents, and it did so with 15% year-to-date sales growth of FRONTLINE PLUS® and 11% year-on-year market growth – a market that FRONTLINE® remained the No.1 brand within.

But its emotional appeal and clear product messaging resonated in other territories too. Our UK TVC has since been adopted by global FRONTLINE® teams and localised for use in European, Latin American and North American countries and China.