PetMe

Background

Dogs on Instagram get a lot of love, while rescue dogs struggle to get any attention.

But what if there was a way to use the influence of these Instafamous dogs to help the non-famous ones get adopted?

Idea

Knowing that people who followed Instafamous dogs were the most likely to adopt, an AI bot was created, capable not just of identifying dogs in any image on Instagram but of matching them up to the most similar-looking hounds that were up for adoption.

The campaign was launched on International Dog Day by inviting dog influencers across Australia to post with the hashtag #PetMe. Automatically, the AI bot commented by showing a dog available for adoption, which every one of their followers could see.

Then targeted ads were created on Instagram. Every time someone liked a photo of a dog, that person got served an ad featuring a similar dog up for adoption.

Results

37 dogs adopted so far and still counting.

Our Thoughts

I can’t believe that there is a still a maths men versus Mad Men debate going on in parts of the advertising world. Data is giving creativity a much-needed shot in the arm, helping advertisers deliver messages to the right people, in the right place and at the right time. At a time when people hate advertising, this has to be good stuff if we creative people want to stay in business, surely? This ingenious idea harnesses data and then relies on machine learning to keep it up to date so that the ad, when it’s delivered, is both relevant and appealing.

The point being, people don’t hate advertising. They hate bad advertising.