From a product once ubiquitous in every household, bleach struggled with relevancy in recent years fueled by misconceptions in the blogosphere and traditional media that tarnished bleach’s reputation. To reintroduce bleach to a new generation of consumers living in a digital world, Clorox and Ketchum created a “Bleachable Moments” program that emphasized the many amazing uses of bleach tied to lifestyle moments.

To drive the message online, the team created Simple & Surprising, a blog on Clorox.com that featured a different guest blogger each month ranging from popular mom bloggers to celebrity comedians and HGTV experts. Each guest blogger discussed a topic relevant to his/her life and included a connection to bleach that highlighted a different use for the product. The blog allowed Clorox to add to the online conversation to help bring bleach back into moms’ hearts – and homes.

The result was a program that helped reverse the negative perceptions online, generated 155 million media
impressions and became the section on Clorox.com where visitors spent the most time.

Objectives

• Highlight the multiple uses of bleach in traditional and social media coverage
• Drive visits and time spent on Clorox.com by creating a new, regularly updated entry point at www.simpleandsurprising.com.

Strategies

• Support the overarching brand strategy to emphasize the multiple uses of bleach by creating a calendar that incorporates bleach into lifestyle moments where it may be a surprising,
but useful, addition
• Leverage networks and popularity of mom bloggers, celebrities and other experts to guest blog on the site and help drive readership and visits to www.simpleandsurprising.com

Tactics

• Develop special, regularly updated portal on Clorox.com: www.simpleandsurprising.com
• Create monthly calendar of timely topics with bleach inclusion
• Recruit blogger enthusiasts and celebrities, relevant to each timely topic, to guest blog
each month
• Create surround-sound approach – leveraging traditional and social media – to drive awareness of the posts and the URL as a call-to-action

Execution

Clorox and Ketchum created a topical calendar to highlight various themes and underscore the many simple and surprising uses for bleach each month. The team worked with mom bloggers, celebrities and other experts to blog each month on the diverse topics and to engage readers with content and insights they could use on a daily basis. Clorox and Ketchum employed a strategic mix of social and traditional media tactics to drive consumers to the content as well as generate traditional media coverage of
the initiative.

Digital Tactics
• Leverage the existing networks of the journal writers, including personal blogs, Facebook pages and Twitter accounts
• Secured partnerships with and content from individuals such as:
o Colleen Padilla with www.classymommy.com
o Samantha Bee, Actress and comedian, The Daily Show correspondent
o Audrey McClelland, fashionista, mom, shopper and blogger
o Joe Washington, host of HTTV landscaping show “Ground Breakers”
• Direct outreach to bloggers to drive awareness of the monthly topic
• Conduct monthly Twitter parties hosted by the guest blogger of the month
• Communicate updates through the Clorox Facebook and Twitter accounts
• Distribute dedicated e-mails on popular mom sites like Momfinds.com
• Reach out to relevant third-party organizations to drive awareness through their list-serves
and newsletters

Traditional Tactics
• Execute a satellite media tour with Samantha Bee
• Conduct outreach to national print outlets, long-lead publications and other traditional news outlets that consistently include bleach tips
• Issue a press release to highlight the five-second rule study and Samantha Bee
• Roll-out audio news releases
• Book and facilitate a New York broadcast media tour with Raven Symoné

Results

• Created ongoing moments-in-time calendar that fueled traditional and social media coverage on bleach uses and drove visitors to the blog
o Program generated more than 155 million media impressions, including coverage in USA Today and on Fox & Friends
o Created deeper relationships with top-tier mom and lifestyle bloggers, including Colleen Padilla, Melissa Garcia, Audrey McClelland and Anne-Marie Nichols
o Outreach calendar from November through August created regular bi-monthly touch points and provided a new reason to engage with consumers

• Drove visits and time spent on Clorox.com by creating a new and regularly updated entry point at www.simpleandsurprising.com.
o Visitors spent more time on www.simpleandsurprising.com than any other part of Clorox.com, staying an average of one minute and 17 seconds
? The five-second rule post averaged a time spent on the page of two minutes and 13 seconds