THE ESSENTIAL BUT HIDDEN MANUFACTURER
THE BRIEF
With a state-of-the-art factory the size of 26 football pitches at an investment of around €3million euros, pump manufacturer Wilo is a trailblazing powerhouse that is quietly running in the background of our daily lives.
Founded in Germany in 1872, Wilo first started as a copper and brassware factory. Now 150 years later, Wilo is a global manufacturer and a leader in its field with more than 70 production and distribution facilities all over the world and a global turnover of over €1.5 billion a year.
From providing essential access to drinking water, wastewater disposal and rainwater harvesting to cooling data centres and even ensuring the rapids flow at leisure parks across the country, water pumps play a vital part in our day-to-day life, yet many of us know little about them.
Globally, Wilo produces around 10 million pumps a year. Pumps across the world use about 10% of the global energy consumption and around 90% of today’s installed pumps are outdated and inefficient, however Wilo is on a mission to reinvent water management and create sustainable solutions.
We were tasked with helping to raise awareness of Wilo’s products specifically with installers, but also generally raising the profile of the brand, its sustainability initiatives, and senior management.
We also took over all social media accounts and created an influencer programme to help promote Wilo products to key demographics.
THE PROCESS
We created a yearly PR planner with set press releases, feature articles and blogs every month.
On top of this, we also pitched senior management for key comment opportunities around industry topics and items in the news.
One of our key focusses during COVID was promoting Wilo via online channels and tapping into a whole new audience of people watching webinars during the pandemic. These were incredibly successful and we invited experts in fields such as data centres, urbanisation and biodiversity to join in chatting about key issues with Wilo senior management.
We also did a complete overhaul of Wilo’s social media channels, with a calendar of posts, social ad spend and a dedicated influencer campaign.
The influencer campaign saw us generate heaps of content from photoshoots which was used across social media, the website and advertising campaigns. The videos and posts created by the influencers helped to build awareness of Wilo’s products, as well as drive engagement across social channels.
As part of the launch of the new factory, we also devised a charity initiative which saw Wilo colleagues embark on a cycling challenge to virtually cycle a huge 1,700 miles from Wilo UK HQ, in Burton-Upon-Trent, Staffordshire, to the new state-of-the-art Wilopark factory in Dortmund, Germany. The challenge raised £8,377 for UK cancer support charity, Maggie’s.
THE RESULTS
Our work successfully helped to raise the profile of Wilo with both installers and general consumers, with a range of coverage in trade and regional press.
We also helped to change the narrative around several important topics including water usage and women in the industry by profiling female installers as part of the influencer campaign.
The changes we implemented to social channels saw Facebook reach up by 324,000%, Instagram followers increased by over 2,000 and an additional 1,600 followers on Twitter, in the first year alone.
