Stay Dead Events

Zombie Survival Simulation

Situation

The organizers of the bi-annual Stay Dead event were in dire straits. When they reached out to us, they had officially sold fewer than 100 tickets, they had not even broken even and had already cancelled the Friday night event due to lack of interest. With sponsor in place, and confirmed participants, they could not cancel the event all together. They were in between a rock and a hard place.

Task

We needed to help them sell tickets, fast.

Campaign

We did several things for them. First and foremost, we needed to put them into a positive light, not that they were in a negative light, but they were not in any light at all. To do this, we reached out to the Edmonton Food Bank, and together came up with a plan that would benefit both the game and the Food Bank.

Second, we then wrote and distributed a press release to the media highlighting the event and gave the media a reason to cover our event by releasing a “zombie horde” in downtown Edmonton at lunch hour to create a visceral experience for potential gamers, the zombie horde drew in curious bystanders and helped raise awareness not only of the event but of their support of the Edmonton Food Bank.

Result

After the event and subsequent media coverage in the Edmonton Journal, Metro News and CityTV ticket sales skyrocketed, the event went from underselling to sold out in less than a week.