CHALLENGE
Increase brand engagement, establish a market leader perception and drive more customers in Dreamland, an operator of children’s indoor playgrounds in Skopje.
SOLUTION
We created, wrote and executive-produced SVEKICKATA OGI (OGI THE CANDLE), a YouTube children’s series that combines animation and live action. In an ocean of clickbait videos aimed at kids, OGI THE CANDLE offers a catalogue of 29 episodes that both entertain and educate toddlers and preschoolers.
CHARACTER DESIGN
Since the client’s core service is hosting children’s birthday parties, we decided our main character to be a live, wish-granting birthday candle. We named it OGI (stemming from “ogan”, the Macedonian word for fire). Having in mind that we wanted Ogi to be available in the brick and mortar locations of the business and to be identical to what the viewers will watch on screens, we decided the character should be a custom-made mascot based on the original design. He was quickly joined by his animated entourage and the series’ supporting characters: a cute little cupcake named TORTICKA, a hilarious purple rhino named LILA and an all-knowing owl named BUBU.
PRODUCTION
Once we created our characters, we started writing the screenplays and cast the parts. We worked with a set of professional musicians to record the songs featured in the series. We kicked-off the animation process with worldbuilding and then quickly went into full gear with episodes production. Ogi was shot in front of a green screen while everything else was animated.
MARKETING STRATEGY
Our marketing and remarketing campaigns combined Facebook, Instagram, YouTube as well as PR. Our goal was to reach parents of toddlers and preschoolers who lend their devices to their kids. We tested various targeting and retargeting options, ranging from very the broadest of audiences to the narrowest, in combination with different campaign objectives. We optimized meticulously in order to consistently get successful results for the lowest cost.
IMPACT
Being the first Macedonian animated series for kids on YouTube, OGI THE CANDLE quickly found its audience and a few months after its YouTube premiere it was picked up by TV24, a national cable television channel where it airs twice a week. Also, it attracted the country’s biggest juice producer as a sponsor of the show. The series continues to garner an average of 5.000 daily YouTube views on the Macedonian media market (approx. 2 million people).
BRINGING THE FANS FROM SCREEN TO STORE
Once we established a connection between our lovable character and child viewers we proceeded to introduce OGI THE CANDLE MASCOTS into the playgrounds. They are now part of the clients offer for hosting children’s birthday parties. This distinguished Dreamland from the competition by being the only place where kids can interact with their new favorite fictional character in person!
MERCHANDISE
Our extensive strategy is now in the merchandise phase and we have designed and published the first round of OGI THE CANDLE COLORING BOOKS. More OGI products are in the works!
LINKS TO SVEKICKATA OGI / OGI THE CANDLE EPISODES
