EXTENDED CASE STUDY

OPTIMUM NUTRITION

How the famous nutrition brand, Optimum Nutrition, leveraged the power of brand ambassadors through an "always-on" influencer strategy.

Optimum Nutrition Influencer Marketing Case Study
Glanbia Influencer Marketing Case Study

Glanbia is a global nutrition group that currently operates in approximately 130 countries worldwide. The group has an extensive portfolio of leading brands in sports and nutrition, all driven by innovations through the creation of nutritional products that fit the lifestyles and needs of people around the world. One of these portfolio brands is Optimum Nutrition, with a long track record of providing the highest quality in post-workout recovery for over 30 years across 90+countries.

Optimum Nutrition (ON) already had a solid positioning in Southeast Asia in the competitive weightlifting and bodybuilding community. However, the brand wanted to reach a wider audience by targeting micro and macro-influencers in the sport and fitness industry in Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines. The brand, which was already managing influencer programs in the region, decided to consolidate its strategy and invest in an authentic, engaging, and long-term brand ambassador program to optimize performance and foster a sense of loyalty and trust among its target audience. This was achieved with the support of the Narrators platform and team.

GOALS

The objectives of Ambassador Program were to:

  1. Identify and engage with relevant ambassadors who possess strong brand affinity, true product appreciation, high community interactivity, and embody ON brand’s value of “maintaining the very highest standards”. The goal is to create content that goes beyond just a paid post and showcases the influencers personal use of ON into their diet and daily lives.
  2. Consolidate ON influencer marketing activities into a single system of record to standardize the approach to brand ambassador discovery and recruitment, campaign management, and performance reporting.
  3. To achieve both global consistency and local relevance in order to maximize the impact on relationships with influencers and their communities. Influencer marketing practices vary from country to country, so comprehending these differences is crucial to the success of the overall campaign (including market maturity, competition, and the cost of influencer partnerships).
Optimum Nutrition's 'Always-On' Ambassador Program 1
Optimum Nutrition Influencer Marketing Case Study
Glanbia Influencer Marketing Case Study

STRATEGY

As authenticity, trust and community interactivity lie at the heart of ON marketing strategy, Narrators designed a custom yearly plan around the following 2 pillars:

Ambassador Program:

A one-year Ambassador Program was implemented with the intention of carefully selecting a pool of highly relevant influencers who are already aligned with the brand values and who can become true advocates by fully integrating Optimum Nutrition (ON) products into their daily lives.

Quarterly Campaigns:

Quarterly campaigns were designed to support the Ambassador Program and boost the number of social signals. The Narrators team crafted this plan with the aim of engaging additional content creators to spread awareness and increase the brand usage among its target audience.

Glanbia Influencer Marketing Case Study
Glanbia Influencer Marketing Case Study
Glanbia Influencer Marketing Case Study
Glanbia Influencer Marketing Case Study

HOW OPTIMUM NUTRITION LEVERAGED THE NARRATORS PALTFORM

ON trusted the Narrators platform to pilot a coordinated influencer marketing programs across Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines. In this approach, the Narrators headquarter (based in Singapore) determined the best strategy and methods that were subsequently tailored for local markets. The interconnection between Narrator’s global and local teams was constant which enabled Optimum Nutrition to leverage cross-national experiences while guaranteeing that a consistent strategy was applied in all markets.

The entire campaign from influencer discovery and recruitment, to campaign execution and measurement, was managed through the Narrators Platform where ON was able to:

  • Publish translated briefs in 5 markets (SG/MY/TH/PH/ID).
  • Engage a group of active ambassadors with on-brand interests and audiences (based on their socio, demo and audience data).
  • Manage the campaign with the help and guidance of a dedicated local account manager.
  • Measure their campaign performance with country-by-country reporting.
Discover & recruit influencers on Narrators Influencer Marketing Platform

RESULTS

The primary KPIs put in place to measure the campaign performance were the number of engagements and reach generated by the ambassadors’ content.

Ambassador Program:

13 ambassadors per market were carefully recruited for the program, resulting a total of 65 brand advocates who actively promoted ON throughout the year. The Ambassador Program was a success generating 1298 posts, almost 3M engagements and 62M reach across Singapore, Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand.

Quarterly Campaigns:

88 sport and fitness enthusiasts were recruited and produced 353 pieces of content throughout the campaign (a mix of Instagram stories, static posts, and reels). The campaign generated 7.1M reach and 1.2M engagements, exceeding the projected KPIs with the Philippines, Thailand and Singapore as the top-performing markets.

Glanbia Influencer Marketing Case Study
Optimum Nutrition Influencer Marketing Case Study
Glanbia campaign results

CONCLUSION

Optimum Nutrition’s partnership with Narrators highlights the importance of balancing global consistency and local relevance in maximizing the performance and effectiveness of influencer marketing at scale. By using the Narrators platform, the brand was able to track and evaluate the success of its program both regionally and locally. These results showcase not only the strength of Optimum Nutrition’s influencer marketing approach, but also the benefit of Narrators’ broad geographic coverage in executing campaigns across multiple markets.

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