Happydent merges crowdsourcing and causevertising...

Happydent, one of Perfetti Van Melle India's flagship brands, has released a new campaign titled #HappydentSparklingSmile, in partnership with an Indian NGO, the Smile Foundation. The digital campaign, created by Grapes Digital, seeks consumer participation to help support the education of underprivileged children.

#HappydentSparklingSmile campaign rides on social reform, highlighting how 'smiling selfies' shared across the online space are not always authentic or genuine. The brand proposes a novel way of engagement for consumers – by sharing 'Sparkling smiles' with Happydent. The process is explained in the campaign video.

With every picture shared by the consumers, the brand promises a contribution of Rs 10 towards the education of kids at Smile Foundation. The campaign also features a series of Indian photographers who have stepped in to participate in the initiative.

Typically, Happydent is known for its comical and quirky advertisements that ride on humour while bringing the forth the brand proposition. For instance, take a look at these ad films from Happydent.

So, why go for a cause based advertisement (or cause-vertisement as it's better known these days), we wondered. It turns out this isn't the first time the brand has joined hands with the Smile Foundation. In 2016, Happydent, in association with the NGO, had launched a similar campaign titled 'Happydent Smile Please'. Just like #HappydentSparklingSmile, the campaign sought participation from consumers in a bid to help educate underprivileged children.

We got in touch with the brand to know more about the campaign. Rohit Kapoor, director, marketing, Perfetti Van Melle India, says, “Happydent is all about sparkling smiles. We were looking for the right opportunity where the brand could give back to society. And so we decided to partner with Smile Foundation. We've partnered with them in the past as well.”

About the conception of the campaign, Kapoor says, “Our brand proposition and Smile Foundation stand for something common – bringing smiles to the faces of people. Grapes Digital came up with this idea to partner with influencers on social media to capture the real smiles. The truth is, most of our smiles in the digital space are merely for the sake of the camera.”

Commenting on the execution, he points out, “We wanted to capture the essence of the campaign in a video format, and convey the story in the right environment, touching an emotional chord with consumers. We wanted to craft the story in a way that would trigger the consumer's interest to participate. And so, we reached out to some influencer photographers in the digital space, and requested them to click some authentic smiles in their domain, and then invited consumers to replicate these efforts.”

Expert Review:

Shrenik Gandhi, chief executive officer and co-founder, White Rivers Media

I think it’s a good, clutter-breaking campaign for two reasons. One, the category generally has had comic campaigns and this cause related one can fly. Second, the timing. Being the start of the new year, everyone is in the mood to do good, feel good and what better timing for a cause campaign than this?

It will make sense if substantial participation is recorded, eventually adding a large amount to the kitty of the NGO. The real success of the campaign is not the media noise, not the social media validation but the real monies donated. And hence, the only con I can see is that it can be a double-edged sword. If enough pictures don’t come in, it might remain a PR blitzkrieg.