John Lewis Christmas ad sets Twitter record

The new and highly-anticipated John Lewis Christmas advert has beaten the company’s own social media record for Twitter mentions on the ad’s launch date, according to research from Hotwire and 33 Digital.

Released on to YouTube last Friday, The Bear and The Hare generated over 49,100 tweets in the first 24 hours of going live – an increase of 21,000 during the same period last year. Of those tweets, 84% were with positive sentiment.

However, although John Lewis’ 2012 festive ad was tweeted about much less than this year’s, the positive sentiment behind tweets was higher at 96%. This rises to 97% for the 2011 advert.

Separate statistics from We Are Social reveal that during the 2013 launch weekend, John Lewis gained 12,000 new Facebook fans and 7,000 new followers on Twitter. Additionally, Bear and Hare’s journey has notched up as many views on YouTube since Friday as the company’s 2012 ad has done in one year.

“John Lewis should be delighted with the overwhelming response and positive reaction to its 2013 advert,” said Ed Kitchingman, senior analyst at We Are Social.

“Its reputation, savvy marketing and clever use of social media to create hype ahead of its official release has helped turn the airing of its Christmas advert into a national event.”