Jack Daniel's and TSA’s Influencer Formula for Doubling Engagement

“We’re almost 160 years old – we're never going to be the new kid on the block,” says Camilla Pendleton, marketing manager at Jack Daniel's UK. She points to a challenge every heritage brand eventually faces: how to earn relevance among the next generation of potential customers.

The plan of attack was to reach 18 to 29-year-olds where they are – on social media. Consequently, the team were on the hunt for an agency that understood this audience and could help Jack Daniel’s show up on their feeds in a contemporary way, while protecting its timeless essence – its ‘brand guardian angels’.

That’s the brief influencer and social media agency, TSA, has been tackling with Jack Daniel’s over the past year. The trick, as Camilla puts it, has been “modernising through context, not reinvention”: taking a more editorial approach to socials that places the brand in cultural spaces that resonate with a younger audience, rather than toying with its established identity.

Thirty five million views, a more-than-doubled engagement rate, and an additional reach of 11 million through influencer activity are the rewards of their combined efforts. According to the brand’s metrics, buzz has significantly increased amongst the target audience.

The influencer strategy has been a big part to this success, and that’s no easy feat when audiences seem increasingly jaded by disingenuous endorsements and scattergun trend-chasing. LBB’s Zara Naseer speaks to Jack Daniel's Camilla, alongside TSA’s founder and director, Harry Foyle, and senior account executive, Alfie Trodd, to deconstruct this intricate element of their winning formula.

Building the Right Relationships

Fundamental to TSA’s influencer strategy were the ‘Friends of Jack’: a diverse network of influencers the whiskey brand collaborates with. Harry and Alfie curated the list thoroughly, only choosing mavericks, as the brand likes to call them, who clearly embody the Jack Daniels values by living life in their own lane and sharing its interest in music and culture.

“It’s a pretty big network,” says Alfie, “and if you tap into that maverick idea, no two influencers are the same. They’re all massively individual, but when they come together as a collective in a room, it still owns that sense of Jack.”

Harry emphasises, “This isn't jumping into a database and plucking names out based on follower data; it’s beyond that. What does their content say, how do they communicate on their profile, and how do they engage their audience? Importantly, what’s their relationship with Jack Daniels?”

Having developed a line of communication and built strong relationships, TSA brought together a variety of influencers who were genuinely excited and proactive when it came to working with Jack Daniel’s, and whom it could regularly tap into at key moments. “That’s the power of building meaningful relationships,” Harry explains. “if they love working with you and the brand, it comes through in their content. Their audiences will know it's authentic, and be more inclined to understand and engage.”

Influencers in the Real World

Jack Daniel’s’ partnership with British musician Freddie Long of Lost Romantic illustrates how these types of relationships are nurtured in practice – and their wider potential.

Harry and Alfie had already been keeping an eye on Freddie’s socials when he made the first move and slid into the Jack Daniel's DMs. He loved the whiskey and was part of a grassroots music band; Jack Daniel’s has championed the UK’s struggling grassroots music venues since 2015, through its sponsorship of the charity Music Venue Trust (MVT). He was a natural fit.

DMs led to gifted product for Freddie’s UK events, the creation of social assets, and eventually, him coming up with his own ideas for future collaborations in the TSA office. “He's a very creative soul, which then led to us chatting to Camilla and the team about a sponsorship opportunity for his tour in Germany,” Harry remembers.

“We weren't just handing him a fee; we were supporting his tour, we were giving him product for his afterparty,” says Camilla. “It just hasn't ever felt like we're shoving our brand down his throat. It's a partnership, and we both know that we're right for each other.”

Jack Daniels now had the ideal partner to call upon when it was once again working with MVT. With the help of TSA, the two companies were sponsoring the nationwide tour of three emerging musical acts, and promoting it through collaborative influencer content.

“We had an enormous amount of organic reach and amazing engagement,” Camilla reflects. The response outperformed even Harry’s expectations: “I knew that content would do well, but I was surprised by the weight of the response, the community, and the comments.”

The relationship with Freddie continued to bloom after the MVT tour, culminating in his feature in a global out-of-home campaign – Harry’s favourite moment of TSA’s partnership with Jack Daniel’s so far.

“To have an influencer that we've built a genuine, meaningful relationship with, who we’d taken on a journey over a period of time, who we’d sponsored on tour, was fundamental,” he reflects. “It was so Jack, and felt like exactly how we want to evolve these relationships above and beyond just doing one offs.”

Above: Freddie with his Jack Daniel's tube ad

The Allure of Exclusivity

“The one I found most rewarding is a byproduct of Friends of Jack,” says Alfie. The team wanted the network to have an air of exclusivity, which has been gradually building over the past year. “The most evident sign of that was our recent house party event.”

A guest list of around 60 influencers and plus ones almost doubled on the night, thanks to the buzz created by the network. “Friends of the Friends of Jack asked us to get on the guest list, which proved the activities that we're doing and the people we're engaging with are inspiring others who now want to be a part of what feels like a movement – less of a campaign, more of a call out to our target audience.”

Calls the next day from influencers who wished they’d been invited demonstrated that people wanted to be associated with the brand, even when they hadn’t been asked to – the goal of boosting desirability among the target demographic had been achieved.

Refining What Works

Metrics like click-through rates prove the strong performance of the influencer content over the last year. Camilla comments, “It was the first time that we've done a mix of brand-owned assets and influencer-created assets as part of a paid media mix at that time of year, and yet they significantly exceeded KPIs and showed that it really drives conversion. We'll definitely be continuing to incorporate that.”

In the future, we’re likely to see those influencers the team have built relationships with continue to crop up in association with Jack Daniel's. “When they show up, it won’t be like it’s come out of nowhere – the audience has probably seen them engaging with the brand before,” says Harry. “Subsequently, they’ll know that it's authentic and they’re therefore more likely to engage.”

Jack Daniel's and TSA will also be refining the way in which they implement the Friends of Jack Network, tailoring their choices to fit specific brands within the Jack Daniel's family, from Honey, to Tennessee Whiskey, to super premium.

Much like their dynamic with Freddie Long, the brand and agency is also keen to prompt moments where influencers can come up with their own partnership ideas, with Jack Daniel's as the catalyst for their creativity.

“Who knows where that will go,” Harry muses. “You can bring influencers together, but if they're then coming up with cool, creative ideas, you're showing that you're a brand that people really want to work with and be a part of. That’s super exciting.”