Balloonacy
- Brand
- Orange
- Year
- 2008
- Objective
- Engagement
- Industry
- Tech & Telecom
- Mechanic
- Racing & Sports
- Platform
- Web
- Agency
- Poke London
Objective
Orange was rolling out Orange Animals, a line of prepaid Pay As You Go tariffs each pegged to an animal matched with a spending pattern — a proposition as dry as any rate card and a hard sell to digitally native 16-24-year-olds on its own. The brand needed a format that turned picking a tariff into something worth playing and talking about, and one that put Orange in front of audiences well beyond its own site.
Solution
At playballoonacy.com, players picked a hot-air balloon shaped like one of the Orange Animals, named it, and launched it into a week-long race. From there the balloon flew on its own, popping up over whichever partner site — from Yahoo! to The Sun — it happened to be crossing, racking up an 'internet mile' for every page it passed. Players tracked their balloon's progress on a navigable 3D map, hit a boost button to speed it along, picked up stars and rainbows scattered along the route, and called in friends on Bebo, Facebook and MySpace to send it extra boosts. Whoever's balloon had racked up the most internet miles by the end of the week won a seven-night trip to Ibiza for themselves and seven friends.
Results
More than 13,000 people signed up to chase the Ibiza prize, sending over 30,000 balloons out onto the track. Over the week, balloons together logged more than 63 million internet miles across 3,000 partner sites, with the winning balloon, Reginald Ringtail the Raccoon, covering 5,033 miles on its own. The campaign generated 3.2 million free brand exposures, and because partner sites paid to join the race, that revenue covered its media and production costs.
- 1
The player lands on playballoonacy.com, billed as the first balloon race across the internet, and is invited to launch a balloon.
- 2
The player picks a balloon shaped like one of the Orange Animals PAYG characters (dolphin, panther, canary, raccoon), gives it a custom name, registers as a racer, and writes a personal message asking friends for a boost.
- 3
Once launched, the balloon drifts on its own across a track of more than 1,500 partner sites, from Yahoo! to thesun.co.uk, appearing as a flying object on any page running the race widget; each page it crosses counts as one "internet mile," the game's score.
- 4
The player can open a navigable 3D map to track the balloon's position and progress along the route.
- 5
The player speeds up the balloon with a boost button that recharges over time, collects star bonuses for extra prizes and rainbows that catapult it forward, and can wave at or boost other players' balloons encountered along the way.
- 6
The player shares a personal balloon link (playballoonacy.com/show/[id]) and posts widgets on Bebo, Facebook, and MySpace so friends can visit and add speed.
- 7
Progress is tracked on a leaderboard ranking all balloons by internet miles covered over the week-long race.
- 8
After seven days the race ends and the pilot with the most miles wins a week in Ibiza for themselves and seven friends, valued at roughly £20,000.
- 9
Separately, any website owner can submit their site to join the race track, letting other players' balloons fly across their pages and drawing traffic from people following the race.
