Hot Octopuss ‘O Game’ campaign wins major mainstream PR award

    Hot Octopuss ‘O Game’ campaign wins major mainstream PR award

    Hot Octopuss has won a major mainstream PR award in the US for its launch campaign for Queen Bee, its first sex toy aimed at women. The PR Week Awards, which were held on March 15th at Cipriani on Wall Street in New York City, celebrated the best PR and social campaigns from the last year with brands such as Heineken, Frito-Lay and Chevrolet all bagging trophies. Tarana Burke, who kickstarted the #MeToo movement, won Best Communicator of the Year.

    Hot Octopuss was in the same Best Consumer Launch category as McDonald’s and Pizza Hut and its campaign, entitled ‘Bring Your O Game’, focused on the importance of orgasms: encouraging open, unashamed discussions about sexual pleasure and empowering women to achieve the orgasms they want and deserve.

    Outlining why the campaign was chosen as the winner, PR Week said: “Orgasming isn’t a topic women are confident talking about. With the launch of its latest sex toy, The Queen Bee, Hot Octopuss set out to break down taboos around the O word and empower women to embrace sexuality as a core part of wellbeing. Aided by Manifest New York, the company opened the world’s first orgasm pop-up store in Manhattan called The Changing Room: By The Queen Bee. Women were invited to the space to talk to sex therapist and orgasm stylist Diana Barone, before donning a silky robe and heading into a luxurious private changing room to try out the new toy.

    “On the day of launch, Hot Octopuss sent pictures of a line of women around the block, which it had staged, to press to generate hype. In the weeks leading up to the store opening, 2,500 women applied for a slot with Barone, and 150 women tried out the product at the pop-up. Sales of the Queen Bee were 350% higher than the total cost of the campaign. The campaign also led to people buying other Hot Octopuss toys.

    “Publications such as Time Out New York, New York Post’s Page Six, and Cosmopolitan covered the campaign. Additionally, social media conversations among US women talking about orgasms increased by 16% immediately following the launch. ‘Clever execution in an edgy category,’ said one judge. ‘Effective use of media with the requirement they experience the product. This brand kept it classy and upscale in a category that can easily become seedy’.”

    Hot Octopuss founder Adam Lewis commented: “We like to do things differently – to stick two fingers up to cultural norms and push the boundaries. We do this not just in the innovative tech we use in our products, but also in our marketing campaigns. ‘Bring Your O Game’ wasn’t just about showing how fast and powerful the vibrator was, but about trying to have a positive impact on the lives of the women who tried it and get people talking more about sexual pleasure.”

    The full list of winners can be found here and for more information about the company and its products visit www.hotoctopuss.com