Case Study: Merck boosts employee curiosity and innovation with Fork Unstable Media

Merck’s curiosity campaign with Fork Unstable Media racks up 41 million Giphy views

Fork Unstable Media partnered with Merck to address the challenge of promoting an internal online program called Activate Curiosity. The program was designed to foster innovation by teaching employees how to use curiosity in science and tech, but the primary hurdle was overcoming employee apathy towards yet another mandatory training initiative.

The solution implemented by Fork Unstable Media used humor and empathy to engage employees. They created a campaign featuring four tongue-in-cheek films that exposed common barriers to curiosity, such as overconfidence and fear of change. This was supported by a Merck-branded Giphy channel for sharing GIFs, which garnered over 41 million views, along with other assets like badges and posters. The campaign was so successful that the films were repurposed for a different internal initiative.

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