Three Minutes in Italy

Last summer S.P. organized a very funny marketing campaign, which involved its American Facebook fans. The idea was very simple: S.P., in partnership with the international advertising, marketing and public relations agency “Ogilvy NY”, based in Manhattan, and another innovation studio, “Deeplocal”, created five sophisticated robots, which the Facebook fans could use to take a virtual tour of Taormina, a picturesque village in Italy (Sicily).

Who was interested in taking the tour, just had to sign up in Facebook and choose between two live experiences: either to get a bird’s-eye view of the village, through a Skybot which showed the Fb users stunning views of Sicily from high above, or to virtually stroll the streets.

I personally find the second option as the funniest one, since it enabled the users to lead the robots through the main streets of Taormina; the robots were equipped with tablets, displaying users’ Facebook profile pictures, and an incorporated translation programme allowed participants to talk with the local residents. Of course, there were brand ambassadors on the ground, to thwart any attempts to use the robots for evil ends.

Actually, I wasn’t able to find the real effects of this campaign on S.P.’s sales in Northern American market.

Anyway, I strongly believe the point is the innovative concept of marketing this campaign stands for: “Three minutes in Italy” reveals the company’s ability in linking the very old concept his international strategy is focused on - the spread of the Italian culture and way of life in the foreign markets - with modern and sophisticated instruments, like the robots and the skybots, by using an everyday “object” like Facebook; furthermore, S.P. is able to get both an economical and a cultural result from it.