• Breathe Right wants to target partners disturbed by snoring
• It teams up with GMTV to create “sleep week”
• Sales rise by 81% and “sleep week” returns in 2009

The challenge

Studies show that 70-95% of UK adults have problems sleeping and Breathe Right wanted to help them get a better night’s sleep.

The GSK product uses 1-inch sticky strips designed to keep airways clear and reduce snoring and improve sleep. The benefits extend to general health and even relationships.
The challenge was to communicate the fact that something so simple could be so effective to the right consumers within a tight budget.

The target audience were defined as victims of snoring – mostly females – who endured rough nights thanks to their partners’ nasal noises.

Research indicated that 71% of those with sleeping problems caused by snoring were females. GSK knew that this audience would be highly influential in driving the noise-makers to find a solution.

The TV solution

Consumer insight studies showed that morning was a key time for this message as those suffering from poor sleep were keen to get on with their day.

GSK identified GMTV as a highly trusted source for entertainment and learning and the first port of call for busy women.

The solution was “sleep week”, a joint venture between GSK and GMTV, designed to educate viewers about sleeping and snoring. Working with Breathe Right, GMTV produced a series of 10 1-minute advertorials to run Monday to Friday during the week-long campaign.

The 10 topics included two on snoring as well as segments on healthy sleeping and nightmares.
At 7.20am and 8.25am Monday to Friday, these short one-minute films would be aired. The advertorials would run with Breathe Right sponsorship bumpers, which were then followed immediately by a 20-second Breathe Right advert first in break to add extra information to the message and reinforce the link between Breathe Right and solving snoring problems.

In the build up to sleep week, Breathe Right sponsored an online survey of GMTV’s 1.5m daily viewers, generating the best ever response in gm.tv history, as well as a rise in traffic at breatheright.co.uk.
The 9,000 responses encouraged GMTV to add more sleep related editorial content, with presenter Penny Smith being investigated by a sleep clinic and additional experts called in to the famous red sofa.

Results

The sleep week reached 4.2m adults and Breathe Right benefited from a 81% sales uplift.
Econometric analysis attributed 39% of it to the sleep week sponsorship despite the fact that it accounted for just 8% of the communications budget.

Breathe Right will be back on GMTV for sleep week in 2009.

“This activity helped to establish the Breathe Right brand in the UK, and to drive strong double digit sales and category growth during 2008.”

Julian Fletcher, Category Director, GSK