Social Samosa takes a look at how mattress brands have been increasingly banking on the power of audio, integrating it into their social media strategy to advocate healthy sleep amidst the younger demographic.
Irrespective of whether one was looking at Indian or global contexts, lullabies and stories have been forever associated with nighttime routines — especially concerning children. When communicating with adults, this adds a layer of nostalgia and recollection of the innocence and comforts of childhood. Playing on these sentiments, mattress brands have recently released a variety of audio-led campaigns to forge connections with potential customers. They talk about the importance of sleep as well as facilitating healthy sleeping patterns. We take a look at some of the marketing strategies at play on the social media pages of mattress brands.
Lullabies & Sounds of Sleep
On the occasion of World Sleep Day 2021, Duroflex launched the first season of Sounds of Sleep, a digital music experience exploring the role of music as a sleep aid. It's a curated collection of popular regional lullabies from across India celebrating and reviving one of the oldest pre-sleep routines. Hosted by film & theatre actor, philanthropist, and mother Kalki Koechlin, the six episodes of the first season will feature prominent Indian singers like Monali Thakur, Shilpa Rao, Chinmayi Sripada, Sanah Moidutty, Shalmili Kholgade, Geetha Madhuri.
“Our earliest memory of sleep music are the lullabies that our parents or grandparents used to sing while rocking us to sleep. Even as an adult music is a great way to relax the mind and body, making it an enriching pre-sleep routine. We wanted to go back to our roots, celebrating this sleep routine tradition from various parts of India and curate it digitally for the convenience of new-age millennial parents," says Smita Murarka, Vice President – Marketing & E-Commerce, Duroflex, explaining the property.
Happy Sleep Stories
Nilkamal, a legacy brand of plastic products manufacturer, recently decided to expand its portfolio with a sleep solutions brand. Doctor Dreams is a digital-first brand aimed to provide a 'Happy Sleep' to a younger demographic. They are actively working with content portals and influencers to forge connections with their intended target groups. One of the essential content formats being leveraged by them is Happy Sleep Stories – IGTV videos of bedtime story narrations in English and Hindi. The brand had collaborated with the Fever Network (Fever FM, Radio Nasha and Radio One) to co-produce these stories for their content section called Snooze Zone. BTS videos were also released.
Quirky & Comics
Wakefit.co recently announced the second season of their Sleep Internship Program. In the hunt to find the Professional Sleeper and promote the program, they collaborated with viral music composer influencer, Yashraj Mukhate. The video showed Yashraj diligently getting dressed for work and yawning his way to the workplace, only to later reveal that his job now is to get 9 hours of uninterrupted sleep every night for 100 nights. At the core of this original-content led strategy is the intent to promote the benefits of a good sleeping pattern.
"At Wakefit.co, we believe in creating content that makes people smile while also bringing to light the need for sleep and home wellness," says Chaitanya Ramalingegowda, Director and Co-founder of Wakefit.co.
To do so, the brand has been actively working in the content space. They have been launched a YouTube channel to produce and release quirky content around sleep solutions. These videos are not directly promotional in nature but do include elements like mattresses in the narrative prominently.
UGC
In an attempt to connect with consumers on social media and get them involved in the brand's larger communication strategy, Centuary India launched Songs About Sleep. Here, they are inviting people to record a video of them singing a song with the word neend or sleep in it. The minute-long video has to be then uploaded online, submitted with the brand being tagged in the post. The content saw multiple entries of people singing old Bollywood songs. The brand has also collaborated with Deepa Kiran, Founder, Story Arts Foundation, to co-create Sleeptime Stories.
Last year, under the restrictions of the lockdown, audio and voiceovers had become an even more powerful tool for brands to create engaging content for social media. Mattress brands seem to have made the most of it to extend the scope of their marketing strategies — they are able to create original content, collaborate with influencers as well as nudge people to put up user-generated content. These efforts are helping them aurally connect with consumers — and stay connected just about long enough to potentially concert leads to sales.
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