Archives




2010 | |

The Midas Touch

Advertiser: AirAsia Bhd
Brand: AirAsia X
Creative Agency: Carat Media Services 
(M) Sdn Bhd
Credits: Darren Yuen (Group Account Director), Maggie Chong (Media Director), 
Justin Murugaya (General Manager, iProspect Malaysia Sdn Bhd)

DIGITAL SEARCH - Midas Touch

Challenge
Upon launching its first long haul flight to London, AirAsia X needed to bring the 2 countries closer to each other. Search was challenged to be the key media in creating long-term awareness and fill seats from both destinations. With the global financial crisis, ‘travel’ seems far from people’s minds.
Solution
Insights showed that despite the economic downturn, people still needed to unwind, and by acknowledging Malaysia as a gateway for the rest of Asia, our communication platform was built. 
These circumstances pointed us to identify keyword groups beyond branded ones that worked towards using the poor economical situation to the brand’s advantage. Creating ads that inspire, and analyzing the competition and seasonality periods to ensure ads stood out and remained highly relevant.
Execution
Combining branded keywords with Asian destinations and having presence when users searched for AirAsia’s competitors proved instrumental in garnering leads. Clicks were filtered through three layers to ensure qualified traffic. We aimed for value positions that brought the best ROI by having outstanding copy and an evaluation process of quality score for every keyword. More than 130 ad variations were deployed and daily tested to cater to seasonality factors such as Easter and other public holidays.
Result
For every US$1 spend, AirAsia X received US$165 in revenue. The results went beyond expectations as we tabulated the numbers from Google and DoubleClick which reported 15,699% return-on-investment! 
In less than 5 months the campaign received 113,201 qualified clicks. Over 9 million impressions and the highest recorded CTR of 19.13%.

2010 | |

BMW Tees Off to a Hole-in-One with Search

Advertiser: BMW Malaysia Sdn Bhd
Brand: BMW Malaysia
Creative Agency: Carat Media Services 
(M) Sdn Bhd
Credits: Vivian Tah (Account Manager), Fan Chen Yip (Group Account Director), Au Jenny (Media Director), Justin Murugaya 
(General Manager, iProspect Malaysia)

DIGITAL SEARCH - Midas Touch

Challenge
The Malaysian leg of BMW International Golf Tournament needed massive PR support to ensure maximum newscoverage and participation from golfers, but old-fashioned Press Conferences and Press Releases hardly guarantee actual coverage, and also started to be increasing irrelevant in engaging our digitally saavy journalist and affluent golfder segments successfully.

Solution
We researched our materials for the best soultion. More than 1 million Malaysians read and/or search for News online daily, and 92% of journalists researched for news material online. From this insight, we innovated a FIRST in Malaysian PR strategy, be at the first source that these segments search digitally for news through Search Leverages PR by embedding our News Releases in Search.

Execution
We analyzed an entire year of gold/sports related search results to create a database of Search words that resulted in top listing in these sites and create a prefictive funnel to filter and estimate likely words that will deliver the same results for our campaign. We then embedded our Online Press Releases with these words, and further augmented them with deep links that ensure searchers are immediately re-routed to our official site.

Results
Our Press Releases hit first page rankings! Google, Yahoo and bing, on the very first day and remained there for a month. Google analytics tracked 1,200 page views of our Press Releases were served, and 71,225 page views reporting about the event were read online. The tournament was also completely booked out.

2010 | |

Bringing China to the Living Room

Advertiser: AirAsia Bhd
Brand: AirAsia
Creative Agency: -
Credits: Darren Yuen (Group Account Director), Maggie Chong Cheah (Media Director), Wong May May (Senior Media Planner), Dorren Teh (Media Planner), Elaine Tan (Media Buyer)

TV - Bringing China to the Living Room

Challenge
AirAsia has the largest connectivity of cities in China. They wanted to boost load of the Malaysian Chinese audience. In a cost efficient manner, they needed educate them about their motherland and invoke a sense of adventure for them to either vacation there or plan a heritage journey back “home”.

Solution
We know that every Chinese person in Malaysia has some burning desire to know where their heritage comes from, but few know what to expect from the various cities & provinces in China. We identified the most cost efficient media through the use of TV, and aired a customized documentary through this media channel. TV was also the media channel that provided great audio & visual combinations that allowed great immersion to the target audience.

Execution
Identifying the best channel and time slot by understanding the target audience viewing habits, we collaborated with 8TV to air an 8-episode documentary series that covered all destinations in China covered by AirAsia. This program was aired in the Chinese language to drive greater affinity with the Chinese target audience, garnering an average of 9 rating points throughout the series.

Results
More Malaysians flew to China after this execution, with an average increase of 12% in load factor, and 16% in revenue for all China destinations over the same period. From an internal survey, overall awareness of other destination such as Chengdu (+32%) and Shenzhen (+26%) saw a remarkable increase.

2010 | |

Unveiling the Oriental Experience

Advertiser: AirAsia Bhd
Brand: AirAsia
Creative Agency: -
Credits: Darren Yuen (Group Account Director), Maggie Chong Cheah (Media Director), Doreen Teh (Media Planner), Wong May May (Senior Media Planner), 
Elaine Tan (Media Buyer)

Challenge
AirAsia became only airline in the world with the largest connectivity to destinations in China. The main cities like Shanghai and Beijing always take the cake, but low awareness of other states & provinces in China was something that needed addressing. Business wise, load and revenue achievements needed a boost.

Solution
The Chinese population in Malaysia are very interested in China as a destination, with very few knowing what really to do or expect of Greater China. Content was scarce and scattered, so when no other content exists, create your own. AirAsia set out to create their own travel documentary, with an 8 episode customized documentary featuring the destinations they cover, aired on FTA TV for all to experience what the various cities in China offered.

Execution
From collaborating with Media Prima to engaging a production house directly, the team set flight to conquer China and uncover the extreme beauty of this country on 8TV. By understanding the target audience viewing habits, the time slots allocated for airing these documentaries allowed us to reach them efficiently and effectively. 8 customized documentary episodes was developed, and aired over 8 weeks. This paved the way for us to “fish where the fish are”.

Results
Overall average increase of 12% in load factor, and 16% in revenue for all China destinations over the same period. Overall awareness of other destination such as Chengdu (+32%) and Shenzhen (+26%) saw a remarkable increase from an internal online survey conducted after the airing of the documentary series.

2010 | |

Bring on the Local Vacations

Advertiser: AirAsia
Brand: AirAsia
Creative Agency: -
Credits: -

NEWS - Bring on the Local Vacations

Challenge
In a challenging year of financial uncertainty, Malaysians still desire vacation time with their family and friends. AirAsia was positioned strategically to make this happen, with its low fares and extensive local connectivity, aimed at promoting local destination holidays to the large Malay community.

Solution
It is known that the Malay community generally is larger in household size. Overseas vacation for them can be expensive. So, by promoting local destinations, and giving them deeper insights on those destinations would spur them to consider a local vacation as a true value viable opportunity. This was made possible with a singular media title collaboration (Harian Metro) that allowed nearly 30% reach of the Malay population, the highest reaching BM daily.

Execution
Together with the editorial team of Harian Metro, they provided an unbiased review of the various local destinations, and AirAsia provided all the travel details including price and flight information. Positioning this whole package in a single page on the weekly travel section “Santai” of Harian Metro, this provided the most appropriate platform to communicate the appropriate message, and give readers the complete picture of a possible travel destination for their local vacation.

Results
An average increase of 17% load factor was achieved in flight bookings corresponding to the featured destination and travel periods. This proved to have the best value in terms of cost of entry and revenue growth. The overall ROI was also spectacular at 2.2.