Ülker: The Brand of Happy Moments

“We are trying to add a little happiness to everyone’s daily life. We produce products that everyone can access and share with others. Because we believe that the moments of happiness which we create cause other happiness to be born, shared and multiplied. Comments and researches from consumers understanding of happiness consists of simple, daily and accessible happiness. It is not the rare, hard-to-reach, great happiness, but daily, simple, little happiness that keeps people alive.” (Lale Saral Develioğlu, Marketing Director of Ülker)

Ülker decided to start the campaign “Happiness is Everywhere” by launching slogans about happiness according to the location and situation in different places where everyone can witness. The outdoor applications of this campaign included the written slogans “Happines Approaches” at the piers, “Happiness is Expected” at the bus stops and “Happiness is caught” at on the buses. In a short time, Ülker accomplished to spread happiness everywhere.

Also, Ülker decided to implement free wifi sources in several bus stops in central Istanbul for a month where more than 10,000 connected. The idea behind was to easily surprise and make people happy when they are waiting for the bus. In the link below, you can find a short video taken in one of the bus stations during this campaign. It can be easily seen how people reacted –with a great smile- when they read the “Free Wifi Point, Happiness is Shared” signs on the billboard, how it leads random people to communicate and spread their happiness to each other. An old man reads the billboard and asks help from the younger ones to connect for the wifi, two men watch football game from one of their phone and shouts when the team they support wins, 4 young men play a game together from their phones, a woman starts taking selfies and others decide to listen to music. As the way Ülker highlighted, their marketing strategy really created joy with a very little spark.

“Ülker’s Free Wifi Point” Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9Z8d8ZUdks

Today, the leading Turkish snack brand Ülker is also very well known in the international market of biscuits and chocolates and aims to enter new ones and expand more each day. In order to reach the position that it is in and also to achieve its goal, Ülker is applying well established digital marketing strategies.

More Than Just a Product

Ülker humanized its brands by creating Twitter and Facebook accounts for each of its biscuits and chocolates and these accounts have been frequently sharing posts with their own tone of voice and identity. They reply to the tweets of people who are hashtaging their names and even the products sometimes talk to eachothers. By this way, Ülker created the opportunity to interact with people and become sincerer in their lives by their genuine posts.

The photo on the left displays a small chat between the products Caramio (chocolate), Ülker Çikolatalı Gofret (wafer) and Ülker Çikolata (chocolate) on twitter. The funny fact about the tweets is that Ülker Çikolatalı Gofret says “We are such a happy family” where Caramio calls Ülker Çikolatalı Gofret “grandfather” (since Caramio is a way newer product).

Moreover, there’s an example of another conversation between the official Ülker and Caramio on Twitter where Ülker says “Happiness is when you see him/her ‘typing’ after the ‘blue tick’ in Whatsapp.” and Caramio replies as “Come on, what does it matter? One can say ‘I was eating a Caramio’ if it is asked ‘Why aren’t you replying back?’”

What’s in the News Today?

Moreover, Ülker also used the power of real-time marketing strategy by sharing posts about its chocolate Caramio which mentions the trend topics of that time. For example, in 2014, iPhone 6 Plus owners started to complain that the phone was bending when they put it in their pockets. While this issue was being discussed intensly in all platforms, Ülker launched an advertisement of Caramio with the humorous slogan “I would also bend if you put me in your back pocket. What’s the deal?” which refers to the well discussed topic.

Additionally, the brand used the happiness theme in different digital platforms in order to reach a wider population. The ones that drew the most interest were the tweets shared by Ülker during the World Cup.

Ülker shared various caricatures to support Turkish national football team with the hashtags “Happiness is Supported”. It also offered people the opportunity of their tweets to be caricatured if they share their comments about the match as a reply for these tweets.

The tanslation for the Tweet: “The 11 players of Turkey’s team! Share your comments about the match with the hashtag #happinessissupported and your tweets will be turned in to caricatures!”

The football player Emre Mor was caricaturized when he was scoring a goal.

The translation for the Tweet:

“Goooaaall! Share your comments about the match with the hashtag #happinessissupported and your tweets will be turned in to caricatures!”

Also, when Brasil was defeated by Germany with the score 7-1 in 2014 FIFA World Cup Semi-Final, Ülker shared the tweet “Guys is there anyone not surprised to 7-1 and doesn’t love Ülker Çikolatalı Gofret (chocolate wafer)?” as soon as the game ended.

Another example for Ülker’s interactive digital marketing strategy was when it’s product’s official account were replying to random people’s tweets.

In the photo below, we see that a Turkish girl called Sude posted a tweet saying she caught the flu whereas Ülker’s product İçim replied her back offering its product Ülker İçim Kefir for her to get well as soon as possible.

Also, there’s another one below in which Ülker İçim Kefir tells another random sick customer “We can offer you our product to strengthen your immune system, just send us your address”.