New Nature's Recipe digital campaign shows cat, dog perspective

New York Times
Nature's Recipe's new digital campaign gives "collar cameras" to pet owners so they can post the photos online in scrapbooks.
Del Monte Foods' Nature's Recipe petfood brand is launching a new digital campaign that says it provides views from the dog's- and cat's-eye perspective. The US$2.6 million "Nature's Recipe for Moments" campaign has the tagline: "See life through their eyes. Experience the moments that Nature's Recipe can provide."
The campaign centers on a microsite, naturesrecipeformoments.com, where visitors can browse virtual scrapbooks of photographs meant to chronicle some of America's relationships between pets and their owners. The photographs in the scrapbooks are snapped by "collar cameras" provided by Nature's Recipe to cat and dog owners who the company deemed to be influencers.
The campaign currently has 40 pets and the goal is for 50 scrapbooks. As part of the campaign, consumers will be offered a chance to enter a contest through the Nature's Recipe Facebook fan page to win collar cameras so they, too, can contribute photographs. Visitors to the site can share the scrapbooks via social media.
The lead agency for the campaign is Digitaria in San Diego, California, USA, part of the JWT division of WPP, the digital agency of record for Nature's Recipe.
"When we think about marketing to our consumers, where our consumers are engaging, we look at using digital to reach them, understand them," said Gina Squara, director for digital strategy at Del Monte Foods, primarily because owners are already "in the digital space."
Sarah Kotlova, vice president for client services at Digitaria, said the goal was to give Nature's Recipe a more emotional approach in a category in which ads can be "very bland," depicting "dogs walking on the beach" or arguing "over what's in the food or what's not in the food: 'We have carrots.' 'We don't have carrots.'"
Influenced by lifelogging, or tracking one's life by capturing data and images with cameras and computers, she came up with the concept to use technology to demonstrate pets' lives "through their eyes, from their perspective," Kotlova said.