The Independent's journalism is supported by our readers. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn commission. 

Scented online banner revealed

Relaxnews
Wednesday 02 June 2010 00:00 BST
Comments
(All Rights Reserved)

Your support helps us to tell the story

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.

At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.

The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.

Your support makes all the difference.

In order to market Brazil's best-selling men's fragrance Kaiak, a local ad agency came up with an interactive scheme that had potential customers trying it out through scented banners that appeared while they were browsing the web.

The agency, called BlackMamba, installed ads on top of the browser service homepages of 15 internet cafés across the country, which read: "The best selling men's fragrance in the country just changed. Want to try it? Click this banner. IT'S SCENTED."

When visitors clicked through, a cardboard banner containing a peel-off fragrance area was "printed" - in fact, released - with the help of specially designed hardware installed in the sides of the computer monitors.

Watch a demonstration of the project here: http://vimeo.com/11880708.

Why such an elaborate campaign for a product that's already so successful? Kaiak is exclusively sold via door-to-door representatives (much like Avon in the US, for instance) and wanted to communicate that its fragrance had changed. Plus: internet cafés seemed like the right place to market the scent, given its cheap and accessible nature (and 77 percent of all visitors in Brazil are male, according to BlackMamba).

The result of the campaign: the click-through rate was 43 times higher than the global average, and 10,000 banners were distributed in just one weekend.

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in