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Maciej Kluk oversees the strategic positioning of Chocolissimo as a premium gifting solution in Poland and across Europe. His leadership centres on scaling product personalisation and aligning the chocolate brand’s portfolio with evolving consumer behaviour.
As a premium chocolate producer, we can struggle to find our sweet spot in the Polish market, and beyond. Brands like ours must compete not only with traditional confectioners but also with e-commerce giants, whose massive advertising budgets are driving up customer acquisition costs.
Furthermore, cocoa prices have spiked following poor harvests. As we, at Chocolissimo, operate within the gifting segment, where consumers often adhere to strict budgets, this surge in raw material costs affected our performance. Before the crucial fourth quarter of 2024 we recorded a 20-30% year-on-year drop in the number of transactions, a decrease in store traffic, and a decline in revenue, despite increased advertising expenditure.
To reverse this downward trend, we required a strategy that would highlight the uniqueness and premium value of our personalised products, providing the emotional touch our customers seek when celebrating special occasions.
Reaching audiences with multi-format video
In partnership with Google and marketing agency FormUp we developed a strategy to deepen customer loyalty and unlock new growth opportunities. To evoke a sense of authenticity, we turned to user-generated content (UGC) on YouTube.
We strategically partnered with independent, specialised UGC creators who excel at producing authentic, customer-review-style videos.
FormUp identified Polish creators who mirrored our premium brand image and resonated with our core audience of women aged 25-45 looking for gift ideas. Rather than relying on traditional influencers, we strategically partnered with independent, specialised UGC creators who excel at producing authentic, customer-review-style videos that build trust and drive engagement.
Our UGC creators stood out from traditional influencers through three advantages:
- Product-first spotlight: Unlike influencers who center content around their personal celebrity brand, our UGC creators positioned Chocolissimo as the hero of the video.
- Relatable peer persona: For a demographic seeking gift ideas, a video from an everyday consumer feels like a genuine recommendation from a friend.
- High-trust authenticity: By using mobile-first editing and organic presentation styles instead of studio-polished production, the videos effortlessly bypassed standard consumer skepticism.
To streamline production, the agency used sales data to select hero products and supplied the creators with detailed briefs, covering everything from narrative scenarios to visual guidelines.
The individual styles of the creators provided our brand with a more human face. Showcasing our products in real-world settings allowed us to present our core benefits, such as customisable chocolate shapes, more naturally.
For example, in this video, one of our creators, AnnaW, showcases our premium chocolate boxes and unique shapes:
While the 15-second videos built the narrative, we introduced six-second bumper ads during the peak holiday conversion window between 6 and 17 December last year. This was the critical phase when purchase intent among our main audience reached its height.
The key element of our strategy was a commitment to real-time monitoring and a flexible response to shifting consumer behaviour during the pre-holiday rush.
To ensure these video formats reached the highest-value viewers, we delivered them directly to tailored audience segments within our Google Ads account. We refined our reach by using affinity segments in our Google Ads account, such as “miłośnicy luksusowych zakupów” (“‘luxury shoppers”). We also selected in-market audience groups focused on holiday demand, such as “dekoracje świąteczne” (“holiday items and decorations”) and “dekoracje bożonarodzeniowe” (“christmas Items and decorations”).
This multi-layered approach allowed us to maximise both reach and frequency of ad contact during this critical gifting season.
Maximising reach through real-time optimisation
The key element of our strategy was a commitment to real-time monitoring and a flexible response to shifting consumer behaviour during the pre-holiday rush.
Rather than spreading our budget thin across the entire holiday season, we adopted a dynamic, intent-led allocation strategy. We divided our campaign by product groups. One group included advent calendars, for which sales begin gaining momentum in November. We promoted UGC ads from 15 November to 26 November, when we noticed a drop in demand.
We decided to run the campaign on a limited budget from 27 November onwards, once demand for advent calendars had declined. This shift enabled us to reallocate more budget to a high-potential window between 8-18 December: we deployed over half of our total two-month YouTube spend into this critical 10-day sprint. This approach allowed us to align our gift-centered creatives with the peak period of buying intent.
Driving growth and resilience amidst market volatility
The combination of authentic storytelling and precise tactical execution helped us uncover new growth opportunities, even within a limited budget.
Here are our three takeaways:
1. Precision timing amplifies impact
Short-form YouTube bumper ads deployed during the pre-Christmas peak delivered a 55% year-on-year increase in unique website visitors by capturing the audience during the critical consideration phase.
2. Creative as a performance lever
UGC allowed us to offset rising raw material costs, securing an 8% decrease in cost-per-click (CPC) across our search campaigns.
3. YouTube drives full-funnel efficiency
Integrating video into the media mix transformed our bottom line. A year-over-year comparison of Google Ads performance during the YouTube campaign period revealed:
- +87% sales
- +58% total conversions
- -36% average cost-per-acquisition (CPA)
Combining profitability with authentic storytelling
We are now planning to scale this strategy through intelligent segmentation. By combining UGC with a profit-first model, we will focus on products characterised by the highest margins and availability, enabling us to simultaneously scale revenue and further improve profitability.
Alongside this, we are looking into expanding UGC use within the bumper ads format. We plan to test ultra-short, dynamic montages based on creators’ materials that capture the emotions of gifting to loved ones in just six seconds.
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