The New Look Eyewear campaign started simply enough. Here at Postmedia Content Works, we had proposed a straightforward, native article to be published on our network — specifically at the Montreal Gazette. However, the client mentioned that a new eyewear collection was on its way in fall 2016, which they hoped would attract Millennials and young professionals.

For Eric Tobon, manager of content solution and media strategy at Postmedia, this provided an opportunity to go beyond the native borders and into event-planning territory. He and his team launched the collection with a pop-up kiosk at Montreal’s Central Station, a heavily trafficked area in the city’s downtown core where the subway, commuter trains, and passenger railways converge.

At the pop-up, passers-by could stop in and try on the latest frames, with a little help from New Look consultants. Tablets were also available to allow people to take selfies with the frames and enter them into a contest. The winner would be featured in the client’s upcoming lookbook for the collection.

“The client wanted something interactive,” Tobon said. “Most of their target demographic is on social media, so they wanted to use a hashtag, and promote the event on Instagram and Facebook.”

The #NLnewlookinghashtag was created to help promote the event in advance on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter, as well as to post about the pop-up as it was happening. Onsite, people were also prompted to use the hashtag, associating it with their own selfies and social media posts.

As the campaign’s producer, my job was to execute the native article and video, which would be available in English and in French. I covered the event, along with a writer and a videographer. The writer interviewed one of the consultants to talk about finding the right frames and how glasses are more fashionable than ever.

For the video, we interviewed various passers-by who wandered into the pop-up environment, focusing on their personal history with eyewear and what they tried on that day.

The article and video were published a week after the pop-up. The English versions appeared in the Montreal Gazette, while the French versions were published in Le Devoir. What made this project notable for Postmedia wasn’t just about staging an event — it was the opportunity given to the audience to have multiple touchpoints throughout the campaign.

For instance, social media drove people to the event, while the event encouraged people to engage on social media — and to check themselves out in the native article and video when it would come out a week later.

Onsite, there were several opportunities to be part of the campaign: either via attendees’ own social media accounts, the tablets provided by New Look Eyewear, or by being part of the video interviews. The client was also active in promoting the event and all its associated activities on their social media accounts.

It was also a 360-degree campaign in the sense that content was published in print, online, and via social media. Plus, in adapting the article into French and taping interviews in that language as well, #NLnewlooking marked the first time that Postmedia collaborated with a French publication on a native project.

“Everything was connected; there were no dead ends,” Tobon said. “There was always an opportunity to experience the campaign in a different way.”

And they did. On our network, the native article delivered more than 91,000 impressions, and time spent on the articles averaged at 3:53 minutes — indicating that readers read the article in full and viewed the video.

On social media, the English article delivered more than 279,000 impressions over eight days, as well as 5,475 clicks and 382 Facebook interactions, going above our benchmark target.

The French article had even better results on social media: it delivered more than 448,000 impressions over 8 days, 8,745 clicks, and 661 Facebook interactions. These results were ideal for the client, since the French audience is larger in our market.

At Postmedia, this campaign allowed us to broaden our scope and to rethink how native campaigns can be fulfilled.

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