Malaysian Media Awards Winners Showcase





2014 | |

Science Makes Headlines with Chickens, Cow Eyes & Spaceships

Advertiser: Petrosains
Brand: Petrosains
Creative Agency: dnaCOMM
Credits: Zenith Malaysia — Chan Yuet Wah (General Manager),Melissa Yeoh (Media Planner); Petrosains — Julian Ooi (Head, A&P, Marketing Department), Azura Daud (Head, PR & Communications, Marketing Department); The Star — Star Publications (M) Berhad

The Challenge
Petrosains, the CSR arm of PETRONAS was created to create wonder for the learning of science. To inspire wonder of science, Petrosains organised the first Petrosains Science Festival in Malaysia. The challenge was to ensure that there were visitors rushing to the event, despite the association of science being boring.

The Solution – Insight & Idea
Newspaper has always been a reliable source of learning. Editorials are more trusted than plain old ads. However, science was thought to be boring and scientific. It was a challenge of how to make it “unboring” in the newspaper landscape which is so text heavy. How do we promote Petrosains the wonders of science in a medium such as newspaper? We needed to stop readers in their track in the name of science. We needed to change the normal science of our newspaper buy. Instead of pure ads, we used the power of editorial as persuasion to give the consumers the reason to go. The editors were our weapon. We focused on more editorials, instead of merely ads. Not just any editorials, but editorials that do not bore the readers with boring science. But first, we needed compelling headlines and pictures, to stop readers, to lure them to reading the articles. And place these discoveries of science into the Main Paper Front Half, to reach more readers, instead of the usual secluded Metro where events are usually placed in. We also had to look at how to drive anticipation of the 1st Science Festival prior to the 1st day.

The Execution
As one of top urban newspaper, TheStar was chosen as “The Official Newspaper” for the Science Festival. Our role was to collaborate with them to bring science alive through newspaper. Instead of just merely providing press releases and photos to editorial team, they were also on ground during the Festival to experience science with fellow Malaysians. And with the hands-on learning and discovery experiences, the editors were able to craft out compelling headlines such as “Don’t be a chicken, come have a blast” and “A feeling that is out of this world”. In articles itself, the wonders of science discovery were weaved into the writings. Eg Defusing a bomb is risky business, how to dissect a cow’s eye and how to build a spaceship. We had one such article every day for the 6 days. These were also replicated into www.thestar.com.my – Main News to support digital content. To increase anticipation, countdown tickers were placed prominently next to TheStar’s masthead and www.thestar.com.my’s Welcome Page, days prior. Event was also promoted in paper’s Twitter and Facebook.

The Results
Over 42,000 people turned up. 5% above the target. As official newspaper partnership, the media ROI was at 3.0x more. More than 2.9 million readers of TheStar were educated on the wonders of science. TheStar editorial team had an exciting time being part of the Festival. Everyone had a blast with science.