From Idea to Campaign: Towers of Tomorrow with LEGO Bricks
LEGO® Bricks are iconic, and one of, if not the most iconic toys of all time.
You know what else is iconic? The Empire State Building. The Burj Khalifa. The Taipei 101. The Tokyo Skytree. The Willis Tower (formerly known as the Sears Tower).
When The Bishop Museum of Science and Nature approached us with plans for their newest guest exhibition, Towers of Tomorrow with LEGO® Bricks — we knew our digital marketing strategy, design, and community engagement would have to match the level of “iconic” that these towers and bricks have achieved internationally.
The results?
More than 17,000 visitors
100 unique scavenger hunt submissions
86,000 impressions made for a truly successful campaign!
RESEARCH & BRAINSTORM
Because this special exhibition was the kick-off for The Bishop’s planned YEAR OF ENGINEERING, we knew we had to get down to the nitty gritty.
Our team of marketing experts met in our monthly “Shark Tank” format to research all things skyscrapers, the history of buildings, engineering, and all the facts about each of the 20 eye-popping towers themselves. We even studied architecture and design. Anything to gather the right content pieces for our dynamic Content Strategy across Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and more.
Key stakeholders at The Bishop’s curation and collections department shared WHY this exhibit was chosen, which gave us key insight to how it fit into the overall YEAR OF ENGINEERING, but more importantly, how it supported their mission and commitment to science and nature.
CONTENT CURRENT
Now it was time to turn the ideas into a promotional plan, including a timeline for teaser, launch, and content planning to create impactful and engaging content throughout the five-month long exhibit.
With a goal to engage the community and a highly interactive exhibit to work with, we wanted to communicate that this was not just any viewable exhibit.
To communicate and encourage interactivity, we came up with the tagline, “What will you build?” A subtle call to action within the tagline, this valuable piece of copy added context to the entire visitor experience.
It also encouraged visitors to show off their own creations, producing valuable User-Generated Content that added to our content source and increased the campaign’s reach and exhibit awareness.
CREATIVE DIRECTION
Melding elements from Sydney Living Museums, Flying Fish, and The Bishop’s personal brand, our Sokos Solutions team were able to create a suite of graphics, posters, flyers, banners, advertising (print and digital) and more, that all cohesively communicated our key messages.
BUILDING BUZZ
With our creative direction in place and materials ready, we were ready to build excitement.
Months in advance to the exhibit opening, we began to tease The Bishop audience with sneak peaks and videos hinting that something new was coming – keeping them on their feet to hear what’s next. With the initial seed planted, we announced the exhibit one month out from opening day to garner public interest and begin building buzz for launch day so we could truly make a splash.
With launch day just weeks away, we reached out to local publications and news broadcasts, inviting them to come get an exclusive first look and interview at the newest thing coming to Downtown Bradenton. We secured appearances on Sarasota’s Suncoast View and Good Morning Tampa Bay on FOX13 – earning The Bishop valuable coverage and reach in their targeted markets.
CONTENT CAPTURE
With installation happening only days before the opening day, our team was eager to get in and get our eyes, hands, and cameras on this exhibit.
It was imperative to capture the experience of this exhibit, which featured truly “larger than life” installations, 200,000 loose LEGO Brick innovation stations, and multiple gallery spaces. Video and photography capture was essential to pair with our content strategy, through social media stories, short-form video on Reels and TikTok, fun facts, hidden features and LEGO surprises. We didn’t want to miss a beat (or brick)!
Take a look at some of our favorite pieces of content we shared:
Welcome to Towers of Tomorrow!
Meet the world’s tallest building, the Burj Khalifa, made entirely out of LEGO Bricks
COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT
The opening of the exhibit went off without a hitch! The community was full of excitement and eagerly participated in the exhibits built-in interactive zones. Through in-house signage, we encouraged visitors to share their experience and creations by tagging The Bishop or using the hashtag #BishopTowers. A portion of our social media strategy including interacting and sharing User-Generated Content.
But as expected, once the opening excitement began to quiet down, we needed a new way to re-engage the community – encouraging previous visitors to come back or convincing those who were on the fence to make the trip. After the initial launch, we enacted two separate community engagement strategies to do so.
First, we kicked off an influencer campaign where we researched and hand-selected a small group of local micro-influencers – family bloggers/influencers with young children, sharing tips for parents, and things to do in the area – to come visit the exhibit and share their experience on their pages.
What’s the point?
By carefully researching and selecting influencers working within the same market, this low-cost investment was able to widen The Bishop’s reach beyond their existing audience, to a targeted audience of parents and families looking for fun things to do in the area. For the cost of a few free admissions, influencer content increased The Bishop’s Towers of Tomorrow exhibit by more than 35,000.
Second, we planned a new “addition” to the exhibit that would provide an incentive for visiting and provide visitors with an activity to participate in while they visit.
We worked with The Bishop team to develop a Scavenger Hunt consisting of educational facts found throughout the exhibit, secret little details and more, to entice visitors to get a closer look – all for a chance to win a LEGO Set of their own! We designed a themed hand-out to provide to visitors that matched the exhibition design and coordinated with The Bishop to add this interactive piece for the remaining two months of the exhibit.
