In 1974, Burger King rolled out its iconic “Have it your method” slogan with a jingle that assured shoppers, “Particular orders don’t upset us, all we ask is that you simply allow us to serve it your method!” Fifty years on, the fast-food chain is taking its promise of custom-made burger orders to the subsequent stage with a contest that’s fueled by generative synthetic intelligence (AI).
Burger King on Feb. 5 launched the Million Greenback Whopper Contest, letting shoppers create their very own Whopper for an opportunity at a $1 million prize and the chance for 3 entrants to have their private tackle a custom-made burger bought for a restricted time. After inputting as much as eight elements within the BK App or through a microsite, Burger King makes use of generative AI to deliver the burger — and a custom-made jingle — to life, giving shoppers a picture and video that may be shared throughout social.
“The Million Greenback Whopper Contest leans into customization in methods we by no means have, and realizing that solely three visitors can have the chance to see their Whopper improvements in eating places, we needed to discover how we might deliver each individual’s submission to life,” Burger King CMO Pat O’Toole stated in emailed feedback.
“That’s the place AI got here in – we all know that AI (and particularly generative AI) will likely be persevering with to evolve the way in which that we create, interact, and optimize completely different advertising content material. That stated, we needed to ensure we entered the area in an genuine method that had roots in our model heritage,” the chief added.
The competition ties into insights concerning the model, the place almost half of visitors customise their Whoppers in a roundabout way, and its advertising priorities round customization and giving shoppers a brand new approach to work together with a Royal Perks loyalty program that helps drive engagement and frequency. The usage of generative AI comes because the know-how is beginning to present use-cases for entrepreneurs after greater than a yr of hype.
“We noticed an enormous alternative in utilizing AI to assist ship a marketing campaign that was genuine to the model, but in addition allowed our visitors to have a seamless and enjoyable expertise. AI has performed a pivotal function, each within the consumer-facing entrance, but in addition in how our workforce assesses and understands the elements that visitors are getting into,” O’Toole stated.
Generative AI is just not with out its dangers and critics. Tales of large AI investments are simply as frequent as ones about dangerous outcomes, hallucinations and deep fakes. However Burger King — a model identified for making advertising bets at the vanguard of know-how — seems to be as ready as it may be.
“AI is like every rising know-how — highly effective, however somewhat unpredictable,” O’Toole stated. “We’ve been making ready considerably on our facet and telling our visitors to anticipate the surprising.”
Beneath the hood
Created by Media.Monks, the competition’s AI-fueled expertise permits customers so as to add as much as eight elements to their Whopper creations, and other than allergens, inedible objects and profanity, the one restrict is their creativeness. Constructing an expertise that’s scalable, brand-safe and privacy-first offered a problem for the advertising and promoting providers firm.
“At Media.Monks, we now have put lots of emphasis into AI data throughout all of the departments,” stated Iran Reyes, vp and international head of engineering on the firm. “Each product division is educated about AI — it isn’t solely tech connecting dots, it is actually realizing how the know-how works.”
Producing customized Whoppers with AI required a number of massive language fashions (LLMs) to be fine-tuned to model tips round what elements might be included and what they’d appear like topping a burger. However the “magic ingredient” is Media.Monks’ use of a devoted workforce — not the builders themselves — for high quality assurance (QA), Reyes stated.
“Our QA workforce is sort of educated with AI as effectively,” the chief stated. “The QA workforce is massive, and so they have lots of expertise working with LLMs.”
“We’re attending to the place hyper personalization is our actuality.”
Iran Reyes
Vice chairman and international head of engineering, Media.Monks
After producing a picture of a Whopper that appears real looking and potential, the subsequent step was working to generate a custom-made jingle that includes a voice rapping concerning the elements in a method paying homage to the model’s fashionable “Whopper Whopper” jingle. Whereas the AI-generated pictures will probably generate essentially the most buzz, the audio is definitely essentially the most advanced element of the expertise.
“It is sort of a dynamic advert… it is truly fairly advanced to match up and join all of the dots,” Reyes stated. “We’re attending to the place hyper personalization is our actuality.”
The expertise took about three to 4 months to finish, together with R&D, backend planning and QA planning. Together with Media.Monks’ mixture of inventive and technical experience, a prioritization of AI allowed for the creation of a scalable, safe and quick answer.
“Everybody ought to find out about AI — that has been our focus for the final yr,” Reyes stated. “It has been an enormous problem and continues to be a problem as a result of AI adjustments on a regular basis.”
The event and evolution of the underlying applied sciences will proceed, making it crucial for entrepreneurs to remain up-to-date on the chances and pitfalls of generative AI.
“There’s quite a bit to uncover and discover on the subject of AI, and that is simply the beginning,” O’Toole stated. “It’s essential that any AI integration is in service of our Company, however our workforce is actively exploring completely different ways in which generative AI will influence how we deploy, create, and optimize various kinds of media.”
