Dive Brief: 

• Heineken is pushing consumers to unplug from social media with a new global campaign, “Social off Socials,” per details shared with Marketing Dive. 
• The campaign includes partnerships with musician Joe Jonas and popular creators including Dude with Sign, Lil Cherry and Paul Olima for a video spot that dramatizes a world where nobody is on social media because they are too busy connecting in real life.
• The campaign launched in the U.S. and will be followed by a global rollout over the next six months spanning TV, social media, out-of-home and digital media across the Americas, Europe and APAC. The effort is supported by brand-commissioned research indicating that over half (52%) of adults are overwhelmed by the pressure to keep up with social media.

Dive Insight:

Heineken is showing consumers what an unplugged life looks like with its “Social off Socials” campaign. The effort is inspired by brand-commissioned research that studied the screen time of 17,000 adults worldwide and discovered that the average person spends nearly 6 hours per day looking at their device. The constant screen time is taking a toll, with 51% of respondents reporting that their social battery is depleted after extended online interactions. That toll is even higher for Gen Z, with 62% reporting that they feel socially drained by digital engagement. 

To help consumers combat digital overload, the brewer teamed with American musician Jonas and a handful of the world’s most followed creators to tell the story of how they would react to empty social feeds if more people were offline and engaging IRL. The two-minute spot depicts Jonas alone in a dystopian world, on a freeway amid abandoned cars. As a version of “What a Wonderful World,” plays, Jonas checks his social feed, which reveals the new content he posted has received no engagement. 

As time progresses, creators are seen eating alone, throwing out their halo lights and resorting to posting flyers on streetlights asking for likes and subscribers. As things get more bleak, Jonas cries to the heavens, “Where is everybody?” only to find the Heineken logo glowing down the street where people have gathered for a good time at the bar.

“Working with creators — who are by their nature always online — to highlight the solution may seem ironic, but they too realize it's about balance and were as eager as us to encourage IRL socializing,” said Nabil Nasser, global head of Heineken, in a statement provided to Marketing Dive. “So many people feel overwhelmed by the pressure of constant online engagement, so we want to show how easy it can be to take a break from social media.” 

The campaign was developed by creative agency LePub and is being supported by PR agency The Romans and creator-focused social agency Billion Dollar Boy. The effort will also include short films posted across the creators’ social channels, where they will urge followers to disconnect and participate in offline experiences. The campaign kicked off with an event last week in New York City where Jonas and the creator Dude with Sign posed IRL in store windows modeled to look like Instagram Reels rather than posting online. Jonas also used the event to debut a new single, “Heart by Heart.”

The effort is part of the brand’s ongoing marketing efforts to encourage people to put down their phones and engage in more real-world activities. Previous campaigns have included creating a throwback limited-edition “dump phone” that contained none of the modern smartphone distractions, a mobile app called The Boring App that discourages smartphone use at in-person social gatherings, and an artificial intelligence-powered phone case that automatically flips a user’s phone face down when the word “cheers” is uttered.