Wendy's
When Wendy’s wanted to shake up the market, it launched a full-funnel, multi-format Snapchat campaign. Its strategy not only made history, but had a significant impact on its awareness, engagement and action metrics, challenging both industry benchmarks and brand perception along the way.
Seeking Success in a Saturated Market
Famous for its four-cornered patty, Wendy’s carved a square-shaped niche in the fast food market over half a century ago. Recently, the restaurant chain set its sights on a new offering: chicken tenders. The issue? Certain brands have been ruling the roost for some time, so cutting through the noise would call for a truly disruptive launch. That’s where Snapchat came in.
Maximizing the Power of Multi-Format
To attract Gen Z consumers already loyal to established chicken brands, Wendy’s needed to make history. So, that’s what it did. For the first time ever, a brand went live across all five Snapchat tabs simultaneously, harnessing the full power of the platform.
By engaging Gen Z wherever they showed up – from discovery to consideration to action – this became more than a full-funnel campaign; it was a cultural takeover.
To start, Wendy’s reintroduced itself as Tendy’s. This infused its brand identity with tenders’ broader popularity and signaled that Wendy’s was embarking on something fundamentally different. Using Snap Map, every Wendy’s location nationwide was then temporarily rebranded as Tendy’s. Doing this turned real-world restaurants into digital landmarks, and transformed everyday map usage into a brand discovery moment, reaching 27M Snapchatters and generating 1M opens on Snap Map placements 1.
Commercials announced the new product, Snap Ads featured a very satisfied Tendy’s customer and Story Ads took inspiration from dating apps, encouraging Snapchatters to match their tender with their ideal dip.
Wendy’s also showed up in Snapchat’s most popular tab: Chat. This meant messages showcasing ‘the endless dip’ options appeared where friends were already talking, sharing, and planning meals - and embedded Tendy’s directly into cultural and social moments rather than interrupting them.
By leveraging Augmented Reality, Wendy’s ensured its campaign was as immersive as it was engaging. Its high-impact lens, built around Snapchat’s face-in-hole formats, transformed users into part of Tendy’s world, turning play into amplification and breaking benchmarks in the process.
To ensure sustained momentum, Wendy’s combined paid and organic video across Discover and Spotlight. Premium storytelling in Discover built credibility and scale, while creator-driven Spotlight content fueled authenticity and repeat exposure, keeping Tendy’s top-of-mind across the funnel.
From Campaign Momentum to Cultural Moment
Wendy’s campaign was a masterclass in reinvention, delivering 696M total impressions across all Snapchat placements. By aligning a disruptive brand idea with a never-before-seen Snapchat execution, it didn’t just launch its tenders – it challenged the market.
High-impact awareness placements built immediate buzz, mid-funnel storytelling encouraged engagement and lower-funnel formats drove intent. Each touchpoint worked together to shift perception from ‘another tender’ to Tendy’s.
More specifically, Wendy’s campaign boosted ad awareness by +7 pt, action intent by +5 pt and product awareness by +4 pt 1. This brand lift was distributed across the ecosystem, with the Lens driving a +14 pt ad awareness lift, Story Ads driving a +14 pt product awareness lift and Commercials generating a +16 pt lift in product awareness metrics 2.
The outcome? Wendy’s turned a menu launch into a cultural moment, proving the unparalleled power of a multi-format full-funnel execution.
More Ways To Win With Snapchat
