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Colosal – how irritable bowel syndrome pills became a pre-election candidate

About the client

Colosal is the first brand under the name of Pontus Pharme d.o.o., a pharmaceutical company based in Zagreb, with branches throughout the region – in Belgrade, Kranj and Sarajevo. Developed as a food for special medical needs, it is specifically designed to help with irritable bowel syndrome – a condition that affects every fourth person in Croatia. The symptoms, which range from diarrhea to constipation, often accompanied by abdominal cramps and bloating, make finding the right solution challenging. However, Colosal stands out for its unique formula that combines butyrate acid (postbiotic), bifidobacteria (probiotic) and fructo-oligosaccharides (prebiotic), providing targeted support to the colon and effectively relieving symptoms under the slogan “Because life requires a strong gut!”.

Challenge

A super election year, like the one in Croatia in 2024, represents a key moment for citizens, political parties and the media. The first elections in line were parliamentary elections, scheduled for Wednesday, April 17, during which leaders could be elected, who in principle should better understand the needs of society and offer more effective solutions. Various political parties bombarded the public with their pre-election promises in an effort to position themselves as the right choice. However, empty platitudes are often full of it, or more precisely, full of sh*t, they make their voters’ intestines cramp and look for a last straw in this chaos. It is in this context that an opportunity has been created in which Colosal can position itself as a solution that provides relief, precisely for the problems caused by politicians in that period, and offers the possibility of a better tomorrow.
The CTA team was primarily faced with the challenge of creating a creative mini-campaign lasting two weeks with a focus on elections.

Solution

In order to attract the attention of users and increase awareness of Colosal, we have created election ads with different messages that are reminiscent of already well-known phrases used by political candidates. We did not want to reveal the product directly, but used a play on words to implicitly suggest the presence of candidates for the election, highlighting the main characteristics of Colosal.

On the Facebook and Instagram profiles of Colosal, we placed a carousel ad with 10 visuals, with the umbrella copyright text: “It offers equal opportunities for everyone, regardless of origin, gender or age”.

Us, too.
One that works!
Equally!
If you give it a chance.
And are not going anywhere.
It starts with us.
They are the worst.
Who would not want one?!
And the ones under the table, too!
All clear.

Although the phrases are reminiscent of politicians and certain parties, they are taken because they can be associated with Colosal. Namely, Colosal is building a strong “domestic policy”, but one in the gut. It worries students and pensioners alike, because irritable bowel syndrome can have all ages. The coalition that will not let them down in this condition is the synergy of Colosal – butyrate, good bacteria and fructo-oligosaccharides, which has been proven to work on symptoms such as diarrhea, constipation and bloating.

Then, we referred to current political messages, such as “Rivers of Justice are coming”, in order to say that rivers of relief come with Colosal, as well as the message of Prime Minister Andrej Plenković regarding “hard cohabitation”, suggesting that Colosal solves the problem of constipation. Although the reconstruction after the earthquakes in Zagreb and Petrinja was slow, with Colosal, it never stops in the intestines. With Colosal, users choose a peaceful future for their intestines and are ready for any challenges in the form of food, i.e. triggers that may bother them. Only the last visual in the slider reveals the product, i.e. the main candidate against the symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome.

We have received a variety of comments, from those who recognized the concept and realized that it was a humorous spin on political campaigns, to those who really thought it was a political page. The campaign lasted until April 17, and during that period we systematically published three visuals on Facebook and Instagram that generated a lot of interaction with the same copyright texts (first, second, third post).

Part of the comments of users who thought it was a political party.
Part of the comments of users who recognized what it was about.

In the same time period, we ran an active Google Ads Display campaign using custom and responsive banners with messages like on Meta. The main goal was to stimulate the curiosity of users to click on the ad to find out what/whom it is really about. Also, on the Colosal website, the front page has been adapted to further clarify the messages of the ads and establish a connection with the product.

The campaign on Facebook and Instagram is divided into two phases. In the first phase, from April 2 to April 9, the goal was to generate visits to the landing page. In the second phase, from April 9 to 17, the focus was on increasing the number of views. We reached 425,513 people, with 1,347,369 impressions and 784 landing page views and a CTR of 1.44%. More than 90% of the views were achieved via Facebook, mostly in the area of the city of Zagreb, Split-Dalmatia County, Primorje-Gorski Kotar County, Osijek-Baranja County, Zagreb County, Istria and Vukovar-Srijem County.

The campaign’s performance on Google Ads was also great, with 10,727 clicks and 1,054,832 impressions, with a CTR of 1.02%. More than half of the impressions, 582,228 of them, were shown in the area of the city of Zagreb, followed by Split, Rijeka, Osijek, Zadar, Dubrovnik, Varaždin, Slavonski Brod, Vinkovci and Pula. The ads were shown equally to women and men, and a slightly better CTR was achieved in the female population.

Thanks to the creativity and engagement of the team, the campaign left a deep impression on the Colosal audience, achieved successful results, attracted the attention and encouraged users to interact and directed them to the Colosal website.

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