Silver ring band engraved "This is a ring, not the ring." floating above its shadow on a magenta background
Submitted by Carmichael Lynch

The Will You? Ring

Influencer Marketing

Carmichael Lynch invented the "Will You?" Ring for Helzberg Diamonds, a proposal ring seeded to influencers and media, which the agency reports drew 90 million impressions in the first week.

90Mimpressions

Case in 60 seconds

Helzberg Diamonds needed a contemporary position on love while engagement itself remained bound to an old ritual, and the agency's survey found that both partners named choosing the ring as the hardest part.

The campaign appears to turn on the gap between how couples actually decide, from choosing an appetizer to sharing the finances, and a ring ritual that still asks one partner to guess in secret.

The organizing thesis was to separate the proposal from the purchase, so a couple could keep the surprise of the question and then pick out the ring they both loved together.

Carmichael Lynch built the work around the "Will You?" Ring, two thirty second films, "So Many Rings" and "Together", and a mailing of the ring, survey results and champagne to influencers and media outlets.

Carmichael Lynch reports 90 million impressions in the first week, the single performance figure the case carries, with the seeded mailing to influencers and media outlets described as the prompt for that conversation.

Strategy Breakdown

Couples approaching engagement, described on the page as modern partners who do everything together, from choosing an appetizer to sharing the finances, and as men who propose and women who wait to be asked.
Relationships have moved towards shared decisions, from ordering food to managing money, while the engagement ring is still chosen alone and, as the page puts it, cloaked in secrecy, and the work sits on that contradiction.
Ring buying is described as overwhelming and secretive, which leaves a jeweller selling a high consideration purchase to one partner who is guessing at the other partner's taste with no way to check.
Helzberg Diamonds is positioned as a contemporary thought leader on love rather than a supplier of rings, so the brand's role is to license a change in the ritual rather than to recommend a product.
Both partners reported the same friction from opposite sides, the proposer unable to pick the ring and the other partner unable to signal a style, so the product removes the guess rather than improving it.

Creative & Execution System

Partners

  • Carmichael Lynch

Participation mechanic

  • Couples take part by using the "Will You?" Ring for the proposal itself and then picking out the engagement ring together, so the purchase becomes a shared decision rather than a surprise one partner arranges alone.

Results & Evidence

MetricValue
Impressions90 million impressions in the first week *

Why Carmichael Lynch's strategy worked

  1. 1

    Inventing an object rather than an advertisement gives a brand a reason to be covered, because a ring that changes how a proposal works reads as news while a claim about modern love does not.

  2. 2

    Commissioned survey results appear to work as the entry ticket to earned media, because they hand influencers and reporters a finding to react to rather than a brand message to repeat.

  3. 3

    A mailing that arrives complete, with the product, the research and the champagne together, suggests the recipient is being given the story and the occasion at once rather than a sample alone.

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