Social & Mobile Advertising

Going With The Flo

By Matt Meier

An analysis of Progressive's Flo campaign, from a social media perspective. Use of Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and YouTube are examined.

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INTRODUCTION
Insurance is boring. There really is no other way to look at it. So how has the number four auto insurance company, Progressive, made a relatively boring endeavor into a media powerhouse? Personification. Insurance is now a person, and that person is named Flo.

Stephanie Courtney as Flo.

DESCRIPTION
PURPOSE Getting insurance is never an exciting process. Its on the same level as watching paint dry, according to writer Avi Dan. So Progressive set out to bring insurance out of the depths of boredom and into something fun and interesting. We wanted to create something familiar, like grocery shopping, said Chris Owen, Progressives marketing business leader. The Flo campaign began in January 2008 with the first of (now) 90+ television spots. Jeff Charney, Progressives Chief Marketing Officer, sought to create an icon following his three Cs: Concept, Character, and Commitment. The concept behind the Flo campaign is the physical location that Flo appears in most advertisements, which is that of a white, open store filled with shelves stocked with literal boxes of insurance. Flo herself is the character, who can be described as sassy and energetic. And the commitment lies in Progressive staying behind the campaign for over five years now, with no end in sight. Flo is not going anywhere, adds Charney. TARGET AUDIENCE Progressives Flo campaign is targeted towards the price-conscious consumer, possibly first time insurance buyers. One of Progressives big selling points is their Name 1

6/3/2013 Your Price Tool, which allows consumers to compare insurance among Progressive and its competitors. This method shows the best possible price to a consumer when they are looking for insurance. The Name Your Price Tool has been heavily featured in many of the Flo television spots.

The Name Your Price tool is a big selling point in Progressive's advertising.

Progressive also makes note of its bundle feature. Bundling insurance means that a consumer can have both their home and auto (and possibly motorcycle) insurance in one package. Bundling can provide savings through discounts and premiums offered by the insurer, such as what Progressive offers. However, some debate has emerged whether bundling is truly as effective as advertised in recent years, namely on Progressives part. So far, this debate is rather minor and has had little effect on the Flo campaign. A secondary character to the Flo campaign was introduced in 2010. This new character was dubbed The Messenger and is meant for a separate audience. The Messenger was created to target the 72 percent of the population that is not in the market for insurance, said James Crolley, the advertising director at Progressive. The idea behind the Messenger is to bring in outsiders to Progressive, where they would (conceptually) be taken to Flo; Flo is the representation of Progressives insurers.

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The Messenger.

MANAGEMENT The Flo campaign is managed by ad agency Arnold Worldwide, based in Boston, Massachusetts. The agency was founded in 1946 and has become one of the top-ranking agencies in the United States in the past few years. Arnold Worldwides other clients include Volkswagen, Volvo, and Jack Daniels. TIMEFRAME Progressives Flo campaign began in January 2008 with its first television commercial. Over 90 television commercials have been produced since the campaigns inception. Flo has emerged as a popular face on Facebook and Twitter in recent years, with social media being a big focal point for the campaign. There are no plans currently to conclude the Flo campaign. SOCIAL MEDIA OUTLETS Flo currently has a consistent presence on Facebook and Twitter and is featured in Google+ and YouTube. Her biggest presence can be felt on Facebook, with a massive 5.2 million likes on her page alone. Progressive also operates its own Facebook page, completely separate from the Flo campaign. This particular Facebook page, however, features a paltry 92,700 likes.

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Flo's page has a huge number of likes.

Progressive's page has relatively few likes, by comparison.

The Facebook page for Flo is regularly updated, but not overly saturated with posts. Facebook posts are also posted during the week and feature content directly related to Flo and not necessarily insurance. This is in line with best practice methods for posting on

6/3/2013 Facebook. These methods include posting during the week and spacing posts out at regular intervals. Flos Facebook page is also currently tied in with a cross -promotions campaign for Despicable Me 2. The current Facebook cover photo features the yellow minions from the movie playing around in the Progressive Superstore. Other Facebook posts include Flo hanging with some of the minions around the Superstore.

Cross promotional campaign for Despicable Me 2.

Flo also has her own Twitter account separate from Progressives Twitter account. Currently, there are 19,737 followers of Flo on Twitter. Much of Flos content is beat-for-beat what can be found on Facebook. For comparison, Progressives Twitter account has 18,171 followers. This would indicate that many of the fans of Flo are on Facebook rather than Twitter, making Facebook the primary social media platform to focus upon for Progressive and Arnold Worldwide.

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A good number of followers, but nowhere near the number as Facebook.

Progressive operates a YouTube channel that heavily features Flo. The profile image and banner image for the channel are all images of Flo. Most of the videos on the channel include television spots featuring Flo, as well as specialty videos produced exclusively for online consumption. The YouTube channel currently has 5,430 subscribers. There are a total of 12 million combined views of all of Progressives YouTube videos.

Progressive's YouTube channel heavily features Flo.

6/3/2013 Progressive maintains a Google+ account that again heavily features Flo. Because of Google+s customizability, the profile and cover photo are more creative here than what is seen on other social media channels. The Progressive Google+ account currently has 161,738 +1s, meaning the number of people who have liked the Progressive Google+ page. There are 134,599 Google+ users that have added Flo into one of their own personal Google+ circles. However, interaction is relatively low, with comments and +1s only in the single digits. Facebook posts number in the thousands (sometimes tens of thousands) of likes for each posts made. Progressive also does not regularly update their Google+ feed.

The Google+ makes creative use of the cover photo.

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SIMILARITIES & DIFFERENCES

Nielsens State of Social Media report clearly indicates a large shift occurring in the social and mobile world. Consumers are heavily moving to mobile platforms to communicate socially and are interacting heavily through smartphone apps. Desktop computing is on the decline and social media usage is on the uptick. The Flo campaign has nestled itself nicely into the throes of Facebook and Twitter, using these two social media channels to communicate to fans and admirers of the campaign. The Facebook page for Flo is largely dedicated to random things featuring Flo; these images and postings are largely meant to get social media users to engage with Flo. The Twitter account is different in this regard. More interaction occurs between other Twitter users and Flo. Progressive has nicely established this method of interaction on Flos Twitter account page, with a text box encouraging users to tweet to Flo. A quick look through her feed shows multiple interactions with other Twitter users throughout a single day.

Progressive encourages users to directly tweet to Flo.

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Flo frequently responds to other Twitter users.

Progressive has also taken the avenue of creating several mobile apps, including one called Flo-isms. This app is downloadable for the two biggest mobile operating systems, Android and iOS. The app is basically a soundboard, allowing the user to pick or randomly choose sayings from Flo. The app has no intrinsic value for insurance purposes and serves only to entertain.

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Flo-isms literally do not sell insurance.

With the Flo campaign, Progressive has not taken any avenue towards social care. Nielsen describes social care as consumers reaching out directly to brands and service providers to voice their satisfaction or complaints, or simply to ask questions. It appears that some consumers are complaining negatively about Flo and/or Progressive through Flos Facebook page, but no interaction has occurred between Flo and the consumer. Progressives social interaction with consumers occurs primarily through their Facebook channel. More consumers go to the Progressive page to compliment or (mostly) complain about Progressives service. Progressive has taken an effort to communicate with many of the individuals who voice their opinions online, though not all persons receive a response.

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Examples of positive and negative comments, with Progressive responding to the negatives.

A special section of Flos Facebook page distinctly lists items that are not tolerable to be posted on her Facebook page, such as offensive material and spam. Interestingly, the contact email for Progressive (regarding assistance) is twitter@progressive.com. This seems to indicate that Twitter is a primary vehicle for consumers to reach out to Progressive, with those requests for help going through a Twitter email account to Progressive.

Progressive interestingly users Twitter as its customer service hotline via email.

TRENDS
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6/3/2013 Nielsens State of Social report shows that mobiles apps are climbing faster than mobile web usage, an 85 percent increase versus an 82 percent increase. Progressive has recognized that apps are where mobile users are spending a majority of their time and Progressive has taken the steps to build out mobile apps. Aside from the previously mentioned Flo-isms, other apps include Flos Favorite Things and Route Rageous.

Progressive's "Route Rageous" online game.

Route Rageous is a mobile web game for Facebook. Many mobile users spend a hefty amount of time playing mobile games, based on Oveltis State of Mobile Advertising report. Based on ad impressions alone, 51 percent of all impressions were through gaming apps. Progressive has taken a wise move in building at a game for mobile use as this is the biggest category for mobile app usage.

OTHER CAMPAIGNS
Progressives Flo campaign is not the only campaign to personify insuran ce to consumers. In fact, its not even the first; Geicos Gecko campaign has been running on and off since 1999. Geico has primarily taken numerous humorous approaches to sell its insurance, such as through its Rhetorical Questions and Cavemen campaigns (which even tied together at some points). The closest direct competitor to Flo is Allstates Mayhem. This person is the personification of all the bad things that can happen to insurance holders, such as a bad teen drivers and wild deer. Mayhem isnt necessarily about selling insurance in the same vain as Flo; instead, Mayhem takes the avenue of showing the many reasons why a person should have insurance to begin with, to prepare for those unexpected mayhem moments. 12

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The personification of everything bad in this world.

Allstate has done an effective and funny method for building out its own Mayhem Facebook page. Nearly all of the Facebook posts relate directly to a Mayhem-ism, such as this one: Im the deceptive-looking hemorrhoid cream you keep on the same shelf as your toothpaste. There is also the clever Meet Mayhems section on the Facebook page. This feature includes nine boxes, each with a different representation of Mayhem, such as the rookie weatherman who says tomorrow theres going to be clear skies.

"Meet Mayhem" is rather hilarious and addicting.

MISSED OPPORTUNITIES
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6/3/2013 Progressive fell into hot water in August 2012 due to an unfortunate series of circumstances surrounding a deceased policy holder and fumbled social media responses. This Flo-gate turned into a firestorm of bad press for Progressive and proved that even Flo is not without her faults. In 2010, a Progressive policy holder by the name of Katie Fisher was killed in a Baltimore car accident. The driver of the other vehicle survived, but had a policy that only covered a very small amount. The family of Katie Fisher had to file a claim the rest of the costs associated with Katies death.

The blog post that nearly undid Flo.

Due to a strange series of events, Progressive ended up having to defend the surviving driver against the family of Katie Fisher. Matt Fisher, Katies brother, would a write a Tumblr post concerning this, which quickly went viral. Other users responded angrily towards Progressive, primarily via Twitter. Progressive, and Flo, responded to many people on Twitter, with a sweet tweet giving out their sympathies. However, it quickly became clear that these were canned (pre-written) responses on the part of Progressive. At the precise moment it most needed to NOT look like a robotic intergalactic uncaring mega-corporation, writes John Jones, it looked exactly like a robotic intergalactic uncaring mega-corporation.

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The canned (robotic) responses from Progressive, featuring Flo.

Progressive failed on its social media front when confronted with the many negative responses it received in response to the Fisher viral blog post. Canned responses do not work in the social media world as users expect human and real responses to come through, even from fictional creations such as Flo. The bungled handling of the unfortunate situation shows that companies, no matter how big or how small, must respond to users in a personable way. Many of these responses are publicly visible, so it is imperative that these discussions show a side of humanity to other social media users and consumers.

AHEAD OF THE CURVE

Progressive has done a great job of keeping up with current social and mobile media trends. The development of apps and a consistent social media presence for the Flo character are good moves on the part of Progressive. However, these methods are not exactly ahead of the curve when compared to other big companies. Coca-Colas Share the world a Coke campaign is still the strongest social media and mobile campaign, one that Progressives Flo has not yet matched. While Flo has created a massive reach over five years of airing through television and social media, the innovative concept is not as strong as Cokes. If Progressive can learn how to take further advantage of mobile applications that are truly inventive, then they can be labeled ahead of the curve.

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Coke's creative method to sharing the world a Coke.

CONCLUSIONS
Progressives Flo campaign has undoubtedly been one of the most successful advertising campaigns ever. With 5.2 million likes, Flo is at the top of advertising icons in the social media world. Entertainment Weekly as even named Flo as the top brand icon of all time. AdWeek placed Flo at number seven on its list of top female advertising icons, even beating out the powerful Rosie the Riveter.

Even Flo can top Rosie.

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6/3/2013 Flo has proven such a huge success for Progressive that the company has even taken measures to value actress Stephanie Courtney. According to estimates, Courtney who portrays Flo in all mediais worth $1 million. Courtney currently earns a yearly salary of $500,000 for portraying Flo, a huge sum of money for a fairly simple advertising icon. Despite over five years of continuous campaigning with Flo, Progressive has shown no signs of ending the character. Flo undertook a Google+ Hangout with fans, which is unique among brand icons. Halloween costumes of Flo were among the biggest hits in recent years, even reaching the number one selling spot on Amazon. Progressive continues to run a Dress Like Flo page through their website, guiding fans to know how to best dress like Flo.

How to dress like Flo.

More recently, Flo has teamed up with her first celebrity in the campaign, featuring Michael Buffer, the legendary boxing announcer. The spots and other tie ins feature play offs of Buffers famous Lets get ready to rumble! phrase, such as Lets get ready to bundle! The images featured on Facebook are very similar to many memes that can be found on the internet, featuring large, all-caps text written in Impact font. Progressive has hinted at the possibility of introducing more celebrities later in the campaigns life.

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Michael Buffer in a Progressive meme image.

Flo does not appear to be coming to an end anytime soon. Progressive continues to spend over $500 million annually, primarily upon the Flo campaign. Jeff Charney says Progressive will keep getting Flo at the top of game for the foreseeable future. As long as she continues to be relevant, said Charney, she can run a long time. And thats our intent.

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6/3/2013 Langlois, C. (2012, October 3). Progressives CMO on Flos 4.5M Facebook Fans And Social

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