CHANNEL 5: ‘PRISON BREAK: LOCATE THE 8’

Making TV interactive, with a pioneering social campaign

PROBLEM: Promote a show with a cult following.

SOLUTION: Make the promotion an immersive experience.

MEDIA: SOCIAL/DIGITAL

Imagine a world without Twitter. Where Facebook is nothing more than a niche website. Where embedding a picture in an email is a big deal. 

Welcome to the year 2007.

At the start of the year, Channel 5 broadcast the second series of Prison Break, in which eight key characters from series one bust out of jail and go on the run.

Rather than simply promoting the series in display channels, we decided to capitalise on the series’ cult status by engaging the fans and getting them to join in the manhunt.

With social media just taking off, we decided to hide the characters on the leading social platforms, which, way back in 2007, meant MySpace, YouTube and Flickr.

Each week for a month we gave out clues about the whereabouts of two fugitives - users then had to scour the web to locate them and type identifying codes into a specially created microsite. As an added incentive to take part, we gave away prizes including a trip to Alcatraz.

One week, for example, players were encouraged to track down CCTV footage of a potential fugitive that has just surfaced on YouTube. (This being an all-hands-to-the-pump early digital project, it was actually me running round VCCP in a balaclava.) 

‘Locate the 8’ received highly positive media coverage, most notably a three-page case study in Revolution. It came third in the IAB Creative Showcase (Feb 2007). And it succeeded on its own terms as a piece of engagement: half of players who started the game continued to play it until the end.