What ‘Squid Game’ reveals about Netflix’s marketing strategy

[ResidentialBusiness]

When Netflix was finally ready to bring back its massive international hit TV series Squid Game for Season 2 after a three-year hiatus, it had a unique marketing challenge: remind people why they fell in love with a Korean action drama that revolves around a murderous contest. 

Approximately 39 months had passed since the debut of Squid Game took the world by storm with its coordinated green tracksuits, Pink Guards, and twisted takes on children’s games. The first season exploded to the surprise of everyone, becoming a global pop culture sensation. Back in 2021, Netflix marketing outside Asia was largely reactive to what audiences were excited about. This time, there were years of anticipation.

Marian Lee, chief marketing officer at Netflix, says there was an excitement internally to re-create that phenomenon, but also a ton of pressure on her teams. “Convincing people to come back to watch the second season is an entirely different proposition than being surprised and having some fun with it.”

[Photo: Netflix]

What came next was a worldwide full-court press of entertainment marketing. Pink Guards were deployed at events, activations, and press appearances around the planet.

The Season 2 campaign kicked off at the Paris Olympics. Pink Guards popped up at Sydney Harbor and Bondi Beach, the canals of Venice, Bangkok’s Chao Phraya river, Saudi Arabia’s AlUla, and Beco do Batman in São Paulo. Fans played Red Light, Green Light live under the Pink Guards’ watchful eyes in Los Angeles, Jakarta, and Warsaw. As of February 14, Season 2 had 14.25 billion owned social impressions, eclipsing Netflix’s biggest Instagram and TikTok posts ever. 

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Netflix Australia & NZ (@netflixanz)

As a result, Squid Game Season 2 captured the most premiere-week views of any Netflix show in history. It spent eight consecutive weeks in the Netflix Global Top 10, amassing 185.2 million views in that time, and quickly became the streamer’s third-most-popular show of all time, after Wednesday and Squid Game Season 1.

The marketing strategy behind the show’s second season is a case study in how to match and elevate fan-generated hype—and it offers a window into how Netflix operates as a global brand marketing organization.

Jakarta [Photo: Netflix]

Found in translation

Squid Game is first and foremost a Korean show. That was the mantra, and that was the foundation from which Lee and Netflix approached the marketing of the show. 

“We have teams in 40 markets around the world, and it would be very American for us to say, ‘Okay, well, now that it’s the biggest show, we’re going to have our largest marketing and publicity teams in L.A. run the campaign,’” Lee says. “It was very important for me that the Korea team retained the strategy for how global teams were going to execute against it.”

This was a major shift for the streamer’s most popular properties like Stranger Things, Wednesday, and Bridgerton, which are exported from the U.S. marketing organization to the rest of the world. Lee created a global task force to connect major markets with the Korean team. There were translators in every meeting, even though everyone spoke English, to make sure any cultural nuances weren’t overlooked. 

São Paulo [Photo: Netflix]

Lee spent the better part of two years cultivating and setting up the relationships between the Korean team and other major markets, in order for the rollout of Season 2—and now the forthcoming Season 3—to be as strong as possible. 

The coordination wasn’t to make sure everyone followed the same playbook, but for the Korean team to really set the creative strategy and then the other marketing teams to take that and figure out the best way to express it in their markets. 

“Creative strategies and creative platforms is the starting point, where everything emanates from, but where you can deviate across markets is in partnerships, or media placements and things like that,” Lee says. “So it was really important for us to spend a lot of time arguing and debating about that creative start point.”

One debate was around the theme of choice in the second season, represented by a voting system that allowed players to choose to stay or leave after each game. The Korean marketing team felt that was the center point—that moral choice. Yet it wasn’t resonating with the other teams. “It’s important that when you’re dealing with different cultures and different languages, you have to find a creative start point that is literally so simple that any agency can run with it,” Lee explains.

London [Photo: Netflix]

This translated into the idea of choosing to participate being a major part in all the live experiences across markets. Runners in tracksuits raced up the Champs-Élysées in Paris. Brazilian fans competed in Squid Game-themed competitions. The brand threw a Squid Game-themed rave in London. 

“The nice thing about Netflix is that you can have a center creative strategy, but every market is going to have different flavors of how they activate with fans,” Lee says.

Paris [Photo: Netflix]

Playing the brand game

When Season 1 of Squid Game dropped in 2021, there were no international brand partners or collaborations. And yet Vans slip-on sneakers sales increased almost 8,000%. Duolingo saw a 40% increase in Korean language learners. 

For Season 2, with plenty of lead time, Netflix lined up a laundry list of brand partners, including Puma for those green tracksuits, Call of Duty, Kia, limited-edition Crocs, Duolingo, and more. But just like the creative strategy, Lee says local markets were in charge of what brand collabs would work best for their audiences. 

“This is a global show, so you really could have global partners, but we also asked all the teams, ‘Who are important partners in your market?’” says Lee. The result was a mix of brands that wouldn’t normally be attached to a single property. In food alone, it was McDonald’s in Australia, Burger King in France, Domino’s in the U.S., and Carl’s Jr. in Mexico. KFC Spain sold more than 400,000 units from its exclusive Squid Game menu and brought in more than $4 million in sales during its four-week run—its most successful activation ever.

“We just said, ‘Okay, what really matters for your market? Make sure you’re doing the most creative and the most fun way to engage with your fans.’ And I think that really worked,” Lee says.

Netflix announced last month that Season 3 will launch in June, about six months after Season 2. Lee says this allows both the streamer and brand partners to better bridge that relatively short gap. 

“That short window is amazing for riding high off of Season 2 straight into Season 3 without wasting media dollars. We can just keep activating and engaging fans now through creative social,” Lee explains.

Beyond that, the brand will keep momentum going with live experiences in Australia, New York City, and Seoul, as well as a video game on its platform. 

Warsaw [Photo: Netflix]

Fans lead the way

The biggest insight that helped Netflix’s Squid Game marketing strategy is one Lee says has already helped other shows and properties. Lee’s teams work to find the parts of a show fans gravitate to most, then create content, experiences, brand partnerships, and more around that. 

“Focus on the fans and really start organically, that is always the recipe for success for Netflix,” she says. For Squid Game Season 2, it was iconography like the tracksuits and Pink Guards, combined with the desire to participate in some (nonlethal!) version of the games. 

“The start point for Wednesday will be different than a comedy with Amy Schumer,” Lee says. “But I really think that the fans tell you what they want to see more of.”

View the full article