Lancôme gave us the goal of launching Hypnôse Drama Mascara and Lip Idôle Butterglow in a way that would create a viral buzz and generate at least 200M total impressions across media, PR, and social—without compromising the brand’s essence of championing both inner and outer beauty. Our task was to spark excitement, get audiences talking, and evoke the “drama” inspired by the products’ names in a fun, engaging, and authentic way.
To achieve this, we adopted an earned-first creative approach, crafting a campaign that felt authentic, organic, and rooted in cultural insight. Our research revealed a significant shift in how people engage with drama today. We looked to reality TV as our source of inspiration for the juiciest, low-stakes drama since it has captured audiences for over two decades with its toxic feuds. However, viewers are growing weary of this negativity, shifting their focus to social media. They engage with speculative gossip, personal stories, and subtle intrigue – think Taylor Swift and Selena Gomez’s whispers at the Golden Globes. This shift inspired us to rethink the very definition of drama, challenging the traditional notion of negativity and bringing back a positive, playful form of drama that was both fun and shareable.
We zeroed in on searching corners of the internet where we could find drama and the voices doing the best job bringing it out into the open. That is where we found our in: to turn the volume down on drama while turning the drama up on lips and lashes.
Our research indicated that audiences are increasingly turning to social media for their daily dose of drama, and that they prefer greater transparency from celebrities, often seeking direct insights through podcast interviews or TikTok tell-alls. The popularity of firsthand accounts and “normal gossip” has surpassed the manufactured shock of traditional reality TV.
Cultural insights and desk research further led us to a slew of articles and social speculation around these celebrity whisper moments. All this research led us to our big idea of staging a ‘Silent Drama’.
Our ‘Silent Drama’ would bring together Hypnôse Drama Mascara and Lip Idôle Butterglow in a dual tease and launch, asking audiences to read our lips to decode the drama unfolding around Lancôme online.
To spark conversation online and tease the product launch, we co-created our silent drama with reality TV and social media stars, Hannah Berner and Paige DeSorbo to orchestrate a caught-on-camera moment that ignites the internet. Caught live, by long-term brand partners, The Lipstick Lesbians, and later “spotted” with our partner DeuxMoi – Paige and Hannah’s heated conversation in public stirred up online chatter and drew the audience into the conversation as it unfolded. Our set? The Lancôme counter at an Ulta store.
To stoke the flames of our online drama, we engaged five influencer partners as our “drama spreaders”. This group included a lip-reading interpretation of our silent drama, a TMZ-style investigation of the spotted video, and a speculative breakdown from the Internet’s publicist Robyn Delmonte (aka GirlBossTown). By partnering with influencers with an authentic connection to real online gossip, we effectively piqued audience curiosity. Our lip-reader exemplified as our top performer with over 3.1M views and 29.9K engagements.
To bring the drama full circle and tie it all back to the brand and launch of Lancôme Hypnôse Drama Mascara and Lip Idôle Butterglow, we had Paige and Hannah post a Get Ready with Me (GRWM) video, followed by a full episode of their podcast, The Giggly Squad, to reveal the partnership with the brand for the launch. The big reveal was detailed in an earned exclusive, with People Magazine featuring both Paige and Hannah.
Select supporting influencers were reactivated in the launch phase to clarify speculation and shut down rumors online by sharing their thoughts and revealing the full partnership with the brand. Girlbosstown, Robyn Delmonte, followed up her breakdown of the drama to share that this had been a clever brand activation from the beginning.
Finally, during the sustain phase, five beauty influencers created silent reviews of the new products, aligning with the “silent drama” theme, alongside traditional reviews and Get Ready with Me (GRWM) content. Beauty influencers tied the drama in across their content by stitching our lipreader video to reveal the products from the celeb caught-on-camera moment. Ultimately, this 360-degree approach across earned, social and influence rounded out the “Silent Drama” campaign that was anything but silent.
The “Silent Drama” campaign exceeded every objective, delivering outstanding results that far surpassed expectations. Our primary goal was to create significant buzz for the launch of Lancôme’s Hypnôse Drama Mascara and Lip Idôle Butterglow through influencer content and broad media coverage.
We partnered with twelve influencers, including Paige DeSorbo and Hannah Berner, producing 65 pieces of content that generated 9.53M video views and over 135K engagements—an impressive volume that demonstrated strong audience connection and participation.
The standout achievement was in earned media impressions. The overall client benchmark was set at 200M impressions across all channels—social, earned media, and PR. We shattered that benchmark, generating a massive 1.5B earned media impressions, which is a 7.5x increase over the original target. This not only exceeded expectations but set a new standard for viral success.
Social impressions played a crucial role in this result. The influencer content and organic virality combined to push our total impressions far beyond the benchmark, reinforcing the campaign’s massive reach and resonance. The launch video by The Lipstick Lesbians received 533K organic views, and the lip-reader content amassed 29.9K engagements and 3.1M organic views, outperforming even celebrity-driven posts.
In conclusion, the Silent Drama campaign didn’t just meet expectations—it shattered every benchmark, delivering 7.5x the impressions initially targeted and generating extraordinary buzz across every channel. It proved the immense power of influencer-driven content to drive viral success and amplify brand awareness.
