P&G launched the "Thank You, Mom" campaign during the 2010 London Olympics to sponsor athletes and thank moms. The campaign aimed to increase brand awareness, drive $500 million in additional global sales, and boost loyalty. P&G created emotional videos thanking moms that were shared widely on social media. The campaign recognized moms' role in raising athletes but did not strongly associate the message with P&G brands. While it increased awareness, the campaign's effectiveness was limited by not clearly linking the content with P&G products.

1. “THANK YOU, MOM”
“Thank You Mom”
(Following the Strategic Planning Model)
Urvashi Bajaj
MIM Alamo Square
Hult International Business School
San Francisco

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Hypothesis:
This paper talks about the campaign called “THANK YOU MOM” LAUNCHED BY PROCTER
AND GAMBLE. “THANK YOU MOM” campaign was started to create an emotional impact on the
people mainly moms so that they can associate this campaign with the brand. This campaign was
launched during 2010 London Olympics games to sponsor athletes and mainly thank moms on
Mothers day for their care and love .They wanted to increase the awareness of their brand during the
London games by giving customers a reason to choose its product over others. They made the
effective use social media like TV, YOUTUBE, and FACEBOOK by uploading videos and short
films. Through the strategic plan and business tactics they wanted to show human value and
emotions towards moms because only if they’ll create unique insight into their target audience minds
then only they will prefer P&G products. This marketing campaign was used to increase the sales by
sponsoring athletes and also their parents stay because they wanted their moms to see their children
playing in Olympics.
BACKGROUND:
Overview:
Procter and Gamble Co. (P&G) is an American Global organization based in Cincinnati, Ohio
founded by William Procter and James Gamble in the year 1873.It is the worlds largest consumer
goods company that markets more than 300 brands in more than 180 countries. The company
produces beauty, health, home, personal and cleaning products and moreover it also includes pet
health snacks and products. It has ranked 86 in the 2012 fortune 500 list with a revenue of $82.5
billion. P&G’s main competitors are Unilever, Colgate Palmolive and Johnson & Johnson, as all
these companies follow the similar strategy. P&G products are available in North America, Latin
America, New Zealand, Australia, India, and Asia. P&G was the first company to conduct deliberate
and data based market research with the consumers, which helped in improving consumers
understanding and improved their daily life. It produced and sponsored first radio opera in 1930 and
also a prime time show.
History:
William Procter, a candle maker and James Gamble, a soap maker, emigrated from England and
Ireland and started a partnership making and selling candles and soap in Cincinnati with the help of
their father-in-law. Gradually its sales reached 1$ million in the year 1859 and then 10$ billion in
1980.P&G was the first one to create a market research department to study consumer preferences
and buying habits. In 1879 the high quality Ivory soap and in 1961 pampers was introduced. In 1996
they got into the department of Food and Drug administration by producing Olestra, a substitute for
fat in cooking potato chips and other snacks and then in January 2005 it announced acquisition of
Gillette which added brands like Gillette razors, oral B and Duracell. Today it operates in 80

3. “THANK YOU, MOM”
countries worldwide, employing more than 100,000 and has 13 billion dollar brands like Charmin,
Tide, Crets , Bounty, Ariel , Pringles ,Pampers , etc. in its portfolio.
Key players of P&G are A.G.LAFLEY (Chairman, President and CEO) , Robert A.McDonald ,
Francis S Blake (Director)
(Procter & Gamble. (n.d.). Retrieved February 21, 2015, from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procter_&_Gamble)
CORE STRENGTHs OF P&G
Proposition:
“To help improve everyday life for moms around the world through its `Thank You Mom'
campaign for the London 2012 Olympic Games.”
Business Goal:
! To increase the sales globally by $500 million and also the growth in market share
! Increase brand loyalty and customer satisfaction during the London games by giving
customers a reason to choose its product over others.
! Increase brand awareness among moms and create emotional impact by thanking them
on mothers day and sponsoring their children.
Consumer
Understanding
Innovation
Scale
Brand
awareness
Go-­‐To-­‐
market
Capabilities

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Main issues faced by Procter and Gamble:
P&G has a competitive pressure from its consistent challengers like Unilever.It has a rising
commodity costs and its market share is also decreasing. It is also facing the problem of
quality control because so many products are there in the market with lower costs. They need
to create brand building by driving their ideas in the form of human values and create an
emotional impact.
[“We will provide branded products and services of superior quality and value that improve
the lives of the world’s consumers, now and for generations to come. As a result, consumers
will reward us with leadership sales, profit and value creation, allowing our people, our
shareholders and the communities in which we live and work to prosper”
( http://www.pg.com/en_US/company/purpose_people/ ) ]
Target audience :
The main target audience of P&G is: Homeowners, Parents, Women and B2B. They have so
many products in the market so every product has a different set of target audience so in order
to increase its sale P&G came with a campaign called “Thank You, MOM” as a promotional
tool. For this campaign the target audience is moms
Problems and opportunities
P&G is losing their market share rapidly as there is cut throat competition in the consumers
good. There is a lot of substitutes for P&G products at a cheaper price. They have an
opportunity of tapping the rural markets by touching their emotions and growing in the middle
class group in the emerging markets. There is a lot of competition in the market so the
company has a lot of pressure of innovation. They want to create customer satisfaction and
better product experience by targeting a particular market that is their main business
goal.They lack in online media and leadership so diversification was required to capitalize on
online media. They want to grow in the key developing markets so that they can attract more
customers by offering low priced products with superior performance. They also want to
innovate and expand into new markets by attracting new customers into the existing brand
franchises and broadening the products used by current consumers.Their main goal was brand
building and create emotional connection with their old customers and attract new
audience.They wanted to provide relevant and compelling content that actually means
something to people with a worldwide campaign that showed they are true to the lifestyle of
their brand and the audience they cater to.

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P&G “ THANK YOU MOM ” CAMPAIGN
P&G’s “Thank You, MOM” Olympic marketing campaign was a great effort to draw attention
on the human value with an emotion impact that spanned their brands. The campaign came to
life with a short film that touches the heart and celebrates the role that moms play in raising
Olympians and great kids during 2012 Olympics games in London. They wanted to create
emotional elements associated with Olympics by thanking moms everywhere so that it can
relate to rational consumers mind expecting to drive the sales. It was promoting 34 P&G
brands like Pantene, Gillette This campaign was made to support those athletes or children
whose parents don’t have budget to pay for their youth’s quality sports programs . that touches
the heart and celebrates the role that moms play in raising Olympians and great kids. P&G
wanted to create a unique position in the minds of people so to break the usual position, and
stand by not being only a product-specific campaign but also a company that cares about its
customer needs and values. They would have gone for both moms and dads but moms are
more worth of thanking again and again. For increasing the sale of products, moms are the
prime target as most P&G products are for moms, so focused targeting helped in increasing
the customer base.
RESEARCH:
Primary & Secondary
P&G is different from others because of its brand loyalty, innovation and quality of the
product .
It uses promotional strategies like advertising creativity and media pioneer to create an image

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about its product in consumers mind relative to competing products. Their target audience is
basically mom, women and homeowners as several P&G consumer products; such as skin
care and home cleaning are addressed to them. In order to attract this segment of market they
created a commercial that created an emotional impact and invited people to take action,
which is the greatest thing in advertising world. It made sense to create a marketing campaign
around moms and celebrate mother’s day by thanking them because P&G calls itself as a
sponsor of moms.
The focus of the marketing has turned towards digital media so first thing that comes to our
mind is social and video and display as their first focus. They wanted to touch Olympians
through the everyday products that their moms use.
So firstly we should collect information with YouTube landing page and social conversations
on Facebook, Twitter, blogs, etc. so as to capture reflective moments from games and moms.
They were particularly interested in knowing the data that was related to emotions associated
with Olympics.
One to one interactions are also very helpful in understanding the emotions of the customers
and will have a lasting effect on them.
Interactive, digital participation from Facebook via a ‘Thank Your Mom’ app, where people
can write a thank you note to their mom.
By doing online surveys and asking people what they feel about such an emotional campaign.
Launching its campaign online by uploading some videos or films on YouTube and Facebook
to hit an emotional cord with viewers.

7. “THANK YOU, MOM”
P&G has a leading market position and believes in providing high level of customer
satisfaction. With the diversified and innovative products they have created a strong brand
image that has lead to strong finances in past years. They make a lot of effort in understanding
its customers and providing them with high quality products. They have won the hearts of
many people by sponsoring through this campaign have raised over 25 million dollars.
Strategic Implications :
! I think the campaign was brilliant as it was fully coordinated and created strong, global
partnership with cause partners like International Olympic Committee but lacked brand
association.
! It earned the highest rating for effectiveness among TV and on other social advertising
services. They have attracted more new customers, which have been identified on the
basis of their purchases. People shared so many videos on Facebook and YouTube
showing their love towards their moms.
STRENGTH
Strong, long-term global partnership
Innovation
Strong brand image
Strong emotional impact
Diversified business structure
World wide distribution network
WEAKNESS
Limited resources
Focus on high end of market
Increased promotional spending to
keep healthy sales
Quality control
Failed to associate ad with the brand
OPPORTUNITY
Developing and emerging markets
Better product experience
Customer Loyalty
Drive sales
Growth of middle class in developing
markets
THREATS
Key competitors are expanding
through acquisitions
Substitute brands with cheaper price

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! It had inspired so many athletes and also has given the opportunity to talented sports
people by sponsoring them. It was able to drive the sales upto 500 million dollar.
! But people were not actually able to relate P&G products with this particular ‘Thank
You Mom’ ad campaign.For the success customer purchase should be the integral part
of measurement.
COMMUNICATIONS GOAL(S):
! Through P&G campaign “THANK YOU MOM” campaign they wanted to create
unique position in the minds of people and announced a commitment to raise $5 million
for youth sports. They announced sponsorship of 150 olympic athletes around the world
and giving $1000 gifts to moms on mothers day.mothers day
! They wanted to communicate an emotional chord , demonstrating that the company
understands needs and challenges by demonstrating the company’s message into stories
that will earn their news and social media conversations .
! They wanted to increase cross brand trial and loyalty by giving consumers a reason to
buy P&G products over other brands and associating its products with satisfaction .
Thus by spending effectively on digital marketing and social media i.e uploading videos
on facebook and youtube and also by promoting on TV .
! Raise awareness among 45% of the target market about the mothering role and motivate
25% among them to message “thank you ” to their moms.
! They want to change the behaviors of moms who buy their children products from
different brands as they want to sell their products through emotional association.
These communication tools should be properly used to reach mass media because
communication reflects 4 dimension :1)Emotional arousal 2)Similarity 3)immediacy ot
liking 4)dominance submission (source : Lagarde, P. (2012). Communication Theories and
context. In Cutlip and Center’s Effective Public Relations (Eleventh Edition ed., p. 171). Glen M.
Broom )
OBJECTIVES:
! Business objective: P&G expects the campaign to drive increase sales globally by 500
million dollars and grow share across all P&G brands in 1 year.
! Behavioral objective: Increase in cross brand loyalty and increase up to 10% increase in
sales participation for both P&G and participating brands.
! Attitudinal :They want people to associate product with the brand so that they will
learn about their brands .

9. “THANK YOU, MOM”
! Strategic announcement and mom videos will raise awareness of their brand before and
after the games and estimated 17 billion of the 76 billion earned media impressions
worldwide by the end of FY2010.
! Emotional impact on the target audience (MOMS) as well as others so that they can
relate the campaign with the company (P&G)
KEY AUDIENCES/STAKEHOLDERS:
The campaign was launched during Olympics but it does not directly relate to sports but
everyone in general that can relate to it.Main focus was not only on athlete’s moms but all
moms in the world because most of the products of P&G are household and beauty products
that women buys.
Primary Audience:
MOMS (Female) Age: 25-34 or 35-44 (highest )
Moms use a lot of products from P&G but there are so many substitute products in the market
so they wanted to make them knowledgeable about the products she buys and the companies
behind them. They show interest in those companies that show human faces and emotional
values towards them and usually buy from them. They wanted to thank moms for their efforts
and care they show towards their kids. With emotional use of language they have a potential
to surpass literary concern
Secondary audience:
Youth: After the research the secondary audience should be the youth as this is the age when
one starts making decisions while staying at home with their parents as this campaign have a
strong brand recall because it has created so much deep connection in these children. They
have become an important stakeholder in carrying forward the brands name .
KEY MESSAGES:
! Will have an emotional and long lasting impact on people as the company is focused on
customer satisfaction. They want to change the behaviors of moms who buy their
children products from different brands.
! The P&G through this campaign will provide young people with greater access to
sports in order to help develop the next generation of athletes and spread the Olympic
Games’ values of excellence, friendship and respect.
! It will create confidence and pride in moms heart for all the efforts and sacrifices they
have made for their children as moms are the most precious woman in our lives.
! Sponsorship will help people to fulfill their dreams and wont put pressure on their

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parents for the money.
! It will improve the everyday life for moms around the world as their children will
express their gratitude.
! It will have a corporate social responsibility like corporate relationship and corporate
citizenship ( source : Legarde, P. (2012). Defining public relation problems. In Cutlip and
Center’s Effective Public Relations (Eleventh Edition ed., p. 337). Glen.M.boom.)
STRATEGIES
! P&G is mothering company so it needs to create emotional and touch feeling that will
emphasize on love and trust with the customers. They need to associate the campaign
with the products of P&G so that if they want to buy consumer products they should
relate to P&G.
! They tried to focus on the moms demographic because most of their products are
consumer-packaged goods and tried to persuade them through the emotional tone to
attract its target customers.
! P&G wanted to bring its “Thank You, Mom” message to life with the opening of
Global Family Home, where athletes can spend time with their families and moms will
be taken care of and pampered by brand teams. They wanted parents to see their
children playing and cheering them up.
! If there will repetition of brand name on TV commercials, social media channels then
people will have a good reputation towards the brand leading to brand equity.
! P&G tried to drive the campaign through the Facebook page and company site by
putting videos and footage about moms and their kids.
! They tried to highlight moms as the heroes giving them so many memories of glory so
that whenever they’ll thought of buying products they will think about P&G
! Print ads are used all over the country specially billboards. Newspapers also covered
this campaign making it huge.
(source: http://strategyonline.ca/2013/10/18/pg-shines-a-light-on-moms/ - ixzz3SimHz1LG )
Tactics:
! Organizing the gratitude ceremonies and interview all big actresses with their moms
and shown them on TV commercials and channels like Prime Time, MTV,etc also put it
on YouTube .

11. “THANK YOU, MOM”
! Created smartphone apps for uploading personalized content in the form of videos,
films, etc.
! Through outdoor advertising like Billboards and bus stop ads and through social
network where people can share interactive conversations between the target audience
and brand.
! They launched contests where the consumers could give their mothers a “gift of thanks”
by buying P&G products and can gain the chance of winning something for their moms.
! During the London Olympics, P&G sponsored boxer Mary Kom’s and other athlete’s
mother’s travel and accommodation to the Olympics so that they can see their children
perform.
! They showed so many short films and videos on the sports journey of becoming world-
class athletes from their mom’s eyes on YouTube, Facebook and twitter and their
website.
! $1000 visa gift cards of moms to all 357 Olympic athletes and also released a series of
videos .
! Opened the P&G family Home in London for the athletes and their parents during the
game.
EVALUATION:
P&G was a success because:
! It created a strong, long term partnerships with cause partners like :Special Olympics
and International Olympic Committee.
! It created a lot of awareness about P&G because everyone knew about this campaign
because still people remember this campaign.
! It resulted in nearly 100$ million in incremental sales,nearly 500 $ million sales in 2013
and achieved highest U.S market share. The result can be seen through the number of
purchases increased after the campaign.
! There were so many interactive participation on Facebook, Twitter and other social
networking sites and so many videos were uploaded via “THANK YOU MOM”app on
Facebook.
! Their famous video “Pick them up” has more than 600,000 social shares and
10,000,000 shares on social sites.
! The YouTube channel is full of mini-documentaries on various athletes and their moms,
with the stories of Charlie white,etc
! They have attracted a lot of media coverage and reached global audience effectively and
around 2,800 media placements.
! P&G did NOT do an effective job of associating its product brands with the Thank You
Mom campaign because people who were buying its products still bought their brought

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not because of the campaign they bought.It didn’t change much purchasing habits of the
people.
Budget:
Particulars
Amount($)
Salary
(staff)
160000
Facebook
150,000
Twitter
page
Maintanence
130,000
YouTube
120,000
Print
Media
100,000
Research
database
70,000
Partnerships
140,000
Administrative
expeneses
50,000
Supporting
materials
40,000
Sponsorship
100,000
Media
partner
140,000
Total
1,200,000

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Conclusion :
! It resulted in nearly 100$ million in incremental sales,nearly 500 $ million sales in 2013
and achieved highest U.S market share. The result can be seen through the number of
purchases increased after the campaign.
! Communicating with the mom segment of the public and established the emotional
communication between the product and brand .
! They have attracted a lot of media coverage and reached global audience effectively and
around 2,800 media placements.
! P&G did NOT do an effective job of associating its product brands with the Thank You
Mom campaign because people who were buying its products still bought their brought
not because of the campaign they bought.It didn’t change much purchasing habits of the
people.
References:
Books-
1) Lagarde, P. (2012). Communication Theories and context. In Cutlip and Center’s Effective
Public Relations (Eleventh Edition ed., p. 171). Glen M. Broom
2) Legarde, P. (2012). Defining public relation problems. In Cutlip and Center’s Effective Public
Relations (Eleventh Edition ed., p. 337). Glen.M.boom.
Website
1)(Procter&Gamble.(n.d.).RetrievedFebruary21,2015,from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procter_&_Gamble )
2 (Case Studies p&g –. (n.d.) (2014 Retrieved February 25, 2015, from
http://taylorstrategy.com/case-studies/pg/ )
3) ((n.d.). Retrieved February 25, 2015, from
http://www.pginvestor.com/Cache/1001180053.PDF?Y=&O=PDF&D=&fid=1001180053&T
=&iid=4004124)
4) P&G Set to Claim Gold in Sochi with Latest 'Thank You, Mom' Olympic Campaign. (n.d.).
Retrieved February 25, 2015, from http://www.brandchannel.com/home/post/140106-PG-
Sochi-Mom-Campaign.aspx

14. “THANK YOU, MOM”
5) (Final Presentation on Procter and Gamble. (n.d.). Retrieved February 25, 2015, from
http://www.slideshare.net/rishirajdas1993/final-presentation-42714632 )