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2021 | |

How treating our customers like a boss during the pandemic made them love us

Advertiser: QSR Stores Sdn Bhd
Brand: KFC
Creative Agency: Astro
Credits: -

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Objective & Challenge
In Q4 ‘2020, KFC introduced the “Pandu Ambil” feature (curbside service) as part of the total KFC Self Collect service to ride on the MCO trend as majority of sales have shifted from Dine In to Takeaway. This new feature has made KFC ordering fast & convenient – users just need to order & pay online, drive to the store and KFC staff will then bring the food to your car. In the past, the Self Collect sales trend has been slow during the nonpeak season, tactical promos contributed to the uplift of the sales but couldn’t sustain the spike. Unless there’s a promo, Malaysians don’t feel the need to order via Self Collect. As people are encouraged to minimize physical contact from the pandemic, we saw the opportunity to: (i) Educate consumers on the benefits of using Pandu Ambil (ii) Convert Existing KFC takeaway customers to Pandu Ambil

Insight & Strategy
Pandemic & lockdown has changed the media scene in Malaysia. TV viewership has increased exponentially as Malaysians are encouraged to stay at home hence spending more time to watch TV. Our economy is also greatly impacted as Covid hits, many business owners have lost their main income source and eventually led to permanent closures as they failed to revive operations during the hard times. According to MalaysiaKini, more than 30,000 businesses have shut down since the start of Covid19 pandemic up to September 2020. Employees are asked to work from home however, as 60% of the economic driver in the country come from of retail, services, manufacturing & agriculture sectors, these people couldn’t work from home efficiently due to the nature of their work and it has led to another worrying fact that they might be forced to take paycut, unpaid leave or even losing their job. As Malaysians are living in fear, being vulnerable to the potential challenges that they might face, KFC wants to make them to feel worthful again from nobody to somebody. Hence, our strategy is to: Team up with Astro and engage their inhouse talents for a branded integration campaign. We developed the campaign theme of “Tapau Macam Boss” as KFC provides the bosslike services to Malaysians who order KFC via Pandu Ambil. We “Tapau” the biggest Malay properties on Astro TV & Digital to build brand awareness & consideration through an edutainment story telling way with the use of influence power from celebrities.

Execution
By leveraging the high viewership talk show on Astro, we sponsored a segment in MeleTOP with the idea of “Parking Tepi Je so you can Tapau Macam Boss”. Social Video In the video, Izzue Islam who were featured as Atuk Kepci came to rescue Afieq Shazwan, the hungry driver being stucked in traffic by explaining how he can “Tapau Macam Boss” with KFC Pandu Ambil feature and ordering steps were demonstrated and ends with both of them getting treated like bosses by KFC staff right in their car. The video was released on Meletop, Astro Gempak & Awani’s social pages to create buzz online. Live Show The story was even extended to the live Meletop program. We had Afieq Shazwan to attend the live show by delivering KFC that he ordered via Pandu Ambil for the 2 hosts (Micheal Ang & Elly Mazlein) and Afieq was interviewed to talk about his Pandu Ambil experience with KFC and how he was able to “tapau macam boss”. Throughout the show, brand message was integrated and we have the animated lower third banner to highlight the promo whenever there’s a brand mentioned by the hosts. Branded Advertorial We also have Gempak, Rotikaya & SiakapKeli to educate the audience on the product’s features. Social Video 30sec branded capsule The campaign also came with the 2nd phase to sustain the noise in which we developed a 30sec branded capsule (cutdown version of the video) and aired across the Top 3 Malay channels on Astro – Warna, Prima & Ria for constant exposure.

Effectiveness
‘OBJECTIVE#1 Change people’s behaviour to do pandu ambil: Drive conversion for existing takeaway users to Pandu Ambil without a tactical promo! RESULT#1: We achieved 25% more selfcollect conversions compared to the precampaign period. RESULT#2: 1 week into the MeleTOP sponsorship, we received 19% more Pandu Ambil orders than before. RESULT#3: We brought in extra 17% of daily traffic & 51% more new users to the KFC Self Collect page after the sponsorship. RESULT#4: KFC’s YouGov brand consideration metric has increased by 3points compared to the previous month. OBJECTIVE#2: Educate consumers on the benefits of using Pandu Ambil RESULT#1: Integration with Astro Meletop has reached 2.1mil of audience, and also achieved 40% of R1+ from the 30s capsule. RESULT#2: The social video has garnered close to 100k views across all platforms, and we gained 112% more views on MeleTOP’s YT than our expectation.

2021 | |

Unlimited FUNZ – Turning a Radio Station Into a Mobile Gaming Hub for Malaysians

Advertiser: U Mobile
Brand: U Mobile
Creative Agency: TBWA
Credits: -

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Objective & Challenge
The Unlimited FUNZ Pack was introduced around July to August 2019 as a refresh to U Mobile’s Unlimited Power prepaid pack, which offers unlimited data for social media, messaging apps and mobile gaming. As with any new product, we needed to build awareness quickly, but Unlimited FUNZ was launched in a challenging environment where the telco market was saturated and new launches were often received with strong negative sentiments from a cynical market accustomed to voicing their disenchantment on social media. As the e–sports arena is a saturated space occupied by almost all the telcos in Malaysia, we had to strengthen our gaming proposition further amongst casual gamers – which would be more relatable to the masses while distancing ourselves from the professional realm of e–sports.

Insight & Strategy
Interest in mobile gaming is enormous, with 57% of Malaysians showing some interest or participation. This amounts to a massive 11 million individuals. The recent 2019 SEA Games saw the inclusion of e–sports as one of its medal events. U Mobile has also been synonymous with sponsoring global e–sporting events such as KL Major 2018, M1 World Championship 2019, and many more. We further extended our engagement with gamers by supporting the local e–sports team – Geek Fam. GlobalWebIndex shows that 40% prefer to play games with their friends. While the realm of professional e–sports is abuzz, this data tells us that most mobile gamers are casual players who play games as a form of entertainment amongst their friends. Delving into the psyche of casual gamers, it was recorded that 41% are continuously looking to improve their gameplay, and they do so by watching how other players play on livestream, such as Twitch TV, YouTube Gaming, and Facebook Gaming. We needed to engage with these audiences on a large scale basis, and a radio presence such as Hot FM’s with a sizeable listenership as well as its 3.4 million Facebook followers propelled us to embark on a partnership culminating in a 1–day gaming hub takeover where we hosted live matches between DJs and callers in PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds Mobile. PUBGM was selected as it is one of the mobile games that subscribers can enjoy unlimited data for with U Mobile’s Unlimited FUNZ.

Execution
The takeover day was a full day with breakdowns to different segments engaging both gamers and non–gamers alike with relatable content. Days before the actual station takeover, we ran multiple teasers to help create hype and inform listeners about the takeover on–air and online. https://www.instagram.com/p/B1YmOFPhn9/ On 21 August, the actual takeover day, HotFM officially announced that the takeover would be running from 6AM to 12AM. With the teasers that ran up until this point, listeners would already be prepared to tune in for a day’s worth of exclusive content. Morning Kick–start talkset (2 minutes) – the takeover started with a talkset introducing U Mobile and explaining that the Unlimited FUNZ Prepaid Pack has taken over Hot FM for a day to bring exciting and exhilarating gameplay to listeners. Game Break (10AM to 12AM) – bite– sized game tips were shared on Hot FM’s social pages to keep audiences engaged via a 1 min on–air and online capsule. https://www.facebook.com/hotfm976/photos/a.436390514270/10157992329209271/?type=3&theater Game Session (12PM to 2PM) – at noon, gameplay was streamed live across various social media platforms broadcasting matches between the DJs, professional gamers and listeners. https://www.facebook.com/umobile/videos/1067279953469926/? comment_id=1067316580132930 Drive Time (4PM) – leveraging on their existing “Cerita Viral” segment, we got the announcers to share mind–blowing stories related to gaming which sparked interest in listeners. Drive Time (6PM) – as evening drive time is one of peak segments with the highest listenership, we got Geek Fam to share personal experiences based on ridiculous stunts that they have pulled or done to level up their gameplay. Night Segment (8PM) – The takeover was capped with a finale giveaway to the first caller through who shared their favourite gaming soundtrack.

Effectiveness
With this one–day takeover, 2.465 million listeners tuned in to the livestream, providing excellent exposure for the Unlimited FUNZ Prepaid Pack as the presenting sponsor. The live session garnered over 39,000 views and 1,000 engagements within 2 hours. We also observed an uplift of 21% in search interest for Unlimited FUNZ during the takeover period, which contributed to a 2x increase in website traffic to the Unlimited FUNZ webpage. As the livestream and pro tips were broadcasted on social media, we noted an increase of 20% in the size of U Mobile’s Facebook fan base on a week–on–week average. By converting a radio station into a mobile gaming hub for Malaysians, U Mobile not only appealed to the broader base of casual gamers, but also won their attention and interest.

2021 | |

BMW’s POP Culture – Personalisation Out Performs!

Advertiser: BMW MALAYSIA
Brand: BMW MALAYSIA
Creative Agency: Invictus Blue Group
Credits: -

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Objective & Challenge
With BMW launching the new 3 Series model, we were tasked with the challenge of engaging the potential buyers. Through Google insights and research, we noted that there are about 8 million auto shoppers on YouTube monthly within Malaysia and 87% of the potential car buyers highlighted that the videos influenced their purchase decision.
However, challenge being the redundancy in the creative messaging that only reflects one messaging across various target audience that are into different phases of their consumer journey. This inspired us to conceptualize a campaign that goes beyond highlighting BMW’s USPs and touch people’s life on more emotional and personalized level. Campaign strategy also needed to solve challenge of developing mass creative that would be needed for deploying personalization at scale. Automation of creative needed to be incorporated into campaign to ensure less brick and mortar work is done by team.

Insight & Strategy
To infuse personalization at the heart of our campaign strategy, we created a comprehensive and data backed creative story telling strategy, targeting users with highly relevant messaging based on the moment they are in. Strategy was based on: 1 – Content An extensive content bucket was created based on user’s viewing habits. Bucket was segregated on the basis of following parameters: Movies, Music, TV Shows, Concerts etc. 2 – Trending Topics In order for us to be highly relevant and real time, list of trending topics including upcoming events were curated. Content strategy was aligned with exact topics to create hyper relevancy 3 – Automation To make sure automation is at place, we used Youtube’s Director mix to automatically create different versions of creative based on user’s viewing habits.

Execution
Through social listening, we identified the latest topics on YouTube that were trending in Malaysia. We crafted video messaging which complimented the trending topics and set up topicled campaigns. We matched trending topics with signature features of the new BMW 3 Series. For instance with Avengers Endgame being a key trend during the launch, our ads were personalized: “What Would Make Tony’s Armor Better? And the answer was reflective of unique BMW features “The BMW Intelligent Personal Assistant, Like The One On The AllNew Legendary BMW 3 Series. Test Drive One Today.” We also leveraged on current pop culture topics such as the Jason Mraz’s Concert: “I’M Yours Is What You’ll Say Upon Experiencing The AllNew Legendary BMW 3 Series. Test Drive Today.” And ofcourse the most anticipated TV series in history, the season finale of Game of Thrones: “Hold The Door! Actually, Nevermind. Unlock The All New Legendary BMW 3 Series With A Digital Key In Your Phone. Test Drive The BMW 3 Series Today.” We did not only focus on trending topics, but also popular topics that are explored on YouTube (music, travelling, cooking etc.) and especially not forgetting BMW’s inmarket topic (car reviews, product introduction etc.). In total, we adapted over 150 customized and current trending centric messages. Personalisation alone isn’t sufficient in driving business goals. We incorporated TruView for Action into the personalised video ads to ensure that our optimisation drives measurable business leads and not just video views. A highly contextual ad provided the perfect boost to drive both curiosity in the New 3 Series and also online conversion, a winwin situation.

Effectiveness
This was the most successful YouTube campaign for BMW Malaysia, shattering all previous video results. The high relevancy stemming from our personalized messaging yielded a 48% engagement rate. From a media efficiency stand point, we drove a Cost Per View of RM0.04 per view down from an average of RM0.12 for the industry. As for Media effectiveness, we noted a 53% increase in CTR and a 10% decrease in CPC when compared to previous video campaigns. The campaign drove over 56,000 website visits throughout the campaign and overall received over 900+ sign ups on site. Furthermore, the campaign was also featured on Marketing Interactive by YouTube as the best in industry campaign execution in the region for video ad personalisation.

2021 | |

Coca-Cola “Unlocks” The City for Malaysians During Lockdown

Advertiser: Coca-Cola Far East Ltd
Brand: Coca-Cola
Creative Agency: N/A
Credits: -

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Objective & Challenge
Malaysia’s Movement Control Order (MCO) changed the fabric of “normal” in the country. Nearly overnight, people could not publicly gather, be near each other and were stuck at home 24/7 leading to psychological and emotional stress. A study found 1 in 2 Malaysians experienced anxiety and depression during lockdown. Coca–Cola Malaysia as business was also challenged to adjust to the new reality. Coca–Cola consumption outside of home was suddenly marginalized. We needed to shift our business priorities to focus on in–home meal occasions to drive sustainable volume. We needed a solution to address both of our business and consumers we serve. We realized we had a unique opportunity help people cope by bringing back some joy and excitement into their lives, during these tough times. The launch of our Cari–Cari Gol campaign in partnership with McDonald’s did just that. Here’s how we did it.

Insight & Strategy
Malaysians, restless and stuck at home were missing three things: FOR 65%, WATCHING FOOTBALL: Malaysia is a football nation, now handicapped from watching their favorite games and sporting events such as English Premier League or the Olympics due to sudden cancellations triggered by Covid lockdowns. GOING OUT AND EXPERIENCING OLD HAUNTS: Consumers, especially those 35yrs and younger, missed going to old and familiar locations: their gym, school, urban exploration, nightlife, eating out in groups and enjoying the food and ambience, as well as for football crazies, missing the scale and energy watching as fans in stadiums. They missed the joy and excitement of being ‘in action’ and on the world ‘outside’ beyond home. FINDING SOMETHING NEW OUTSIDE: Neuroscientific evidence shows people place great value and meaning to places, and that different places evoke different emotions, such as joy, security, and wellbeing. The discovery of new places and things trigger emotional relief and excitement. OUR STRATEGY We merged Malaysian’s common interests together: Football, The Familiar and The New, to get them excited and be in ‘action’, through a gamified “Virtual Reality (VR) Football Treasure Hunt” unlocked through a meal–bundling activation with McDonald’s.

Execution
LOCAL BECOMES VIRTUAL We virtually augmented real locations in Malaysia and turned them into treasure–hunting virtual environments as game levels that users could immerse in, explore, and discover hidden prizes within, using their mobile devices. The locations need to be familiar and missed among the Malaysians during the lockdown: Bukit Jalil Stadium, Shah Alam Football Stadium, historic Chinatown street (Lorong Panggung), several universities and gyms! These locations were also chosen because they were suitable for interactive and immersive treasure–hunting: rich in the number of exploration spots, with hidden spaces where our little JavaScript elves could hide the prizes. Treasure–hunt mechanics were weaved into the 3D data, and incorporated exciting football–related sound effects, imagery, prizes, and concepts to fulfill our young consumers’ explorative slant. KICKSTARTING THE GAME The McDonald’s and Coca–Cola meal, provided a “virtual key” to access this experience in three steps: 1. Consumers scan the QR code on the McDonald’s x Coke cup part of the meal. 2. Upload a receipt image as proof of purchase of McDonald’s meal with Coca–Cola beverage. 3. Start “Cari–Cari Gol” in our 1st ever VR football hunt! Stomachs happy, fun begins! The experience kicks off with the sound of a football referee blowing his whistle. The player then navigates skillfully around the environment, weaving around walls, doorways, and pillars for a possible prize, which could be in virtually any nook or cranny. When a prize is found, the player must make a game–changing decision whether to forego the prize for a chance to find a better substitute prize elsewhere in the virtual environment. Over +20,000 prizes were chosen specifically to cater to the football theme, namely Coke football keychains, EPL club jerseys, tickets to live EPL matches in the UK and more. REALTIME, INGAME ADJUSTMENTS KEEP CONSUMER ENGAGED We found players were starting to strategize and discuss tactics based on their play habits. Two interesting types of players emerged, and we responded with the right triggers in real–time to keep them engaged. COMPETITIVE STRATEGISTS: we found a segment of gamers who played and experimented with far more levels than the rest. This trend coincided with the emergence of game levels with a high win–to–play ratio AND a high play rate. These players spent a great deal of time honing their skills, by playing more than 30 times (!), and kept playing and “gaming the game” to trade up to a better prize than they currently had. We kept these strategists engaged and hooked by giving them the opportunity to find performance–enhancing powerups that added even more time to the game to find better prizes. QUICK HITTERS: While other spent a great deal of time strategizing the game, some players were naturals and needed less time, with the fastest winning time finding a prize within 11 seconds. Players that find a prize in the hunt within 60 seconds from the start were notified immediately for verification and were rewarded with the kind of instant gratification that made them come back for more: having their football–related prize delivered to them right at their doorstep shortly!

Effectiveness
We reached over 7M people and drove over 650,000 engagements on social media. The game brought over 76,000 visitors, with over 9,700 returning visitors. Business spiked! The average number of meals purchased for repeat participation in the game was also increased to five meals, within the two–month period, two meals greater than the norm. All this at ZERO ATL budget. Best of all, a wide community of players got absolutely immersed! Google Analytics shows 50% interested in sports, 8% in football, and 45% interested in fast food, a wide mix of players! The standard deviation of number of plays across the game levels by the end of the campaign rose to almost 2.5 times that of game level plays at the beginning. More than a game, we gave them joy, distraction, respite, and another reason “to play on.”

2021 | |

Hong Leong Bank – Finding Gold Through The Magic Window

Advertiser: Hong Leong Bank
Brand: Hong Leong Bank
Creative Agency: Naga DDB Malaysia
Credits: -

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Objective & Challenge
A priceless insight with loans, it’s not just “Who”, but “When”. About 80% of Personal Loan (PL) applications in Malaysia are fruitless for both customer and bank, with an average industry loan approval rate of only 20%. This stringency is driven by the banks’ need to maintain their overall credit health. We needed to help Hong Leong Bank (HLB) to improve these odds. But How? We knew that there was a demand for personal loans but conversions were not happening for HLB. We had to identify how we could do better and target quality applicants, in order to achieve the challenging KPIs set by the client: a) Increase in PL applications by 15% over the previous year (4,344) b) Increase in PL average approval rate to 23% (industry average is 20%, HLB previous year was 19%)

Insight & Strategy
Exploring the “Magic Window” We wanted to help HLB to sift and collect the nuggets of gold the good loan applicants more effectively. To identify we used our proprietary data suite to look into consumer behaviour data and discovered a powerful truth when it came to personal loans: “Timing is everything.” We discovered that HLB’s PL applications were at the highest in the first two weeks of the month. Knowing when was half the battle, we had to know who So we turned to our proprietary data suite to analyse HLB’s 1st party data. This tool not only gave us insights into the behaviour of 18M Malaysians across 23M digital IDs, but also helped us predict recurring and future behaviour. Moreover by incorporating HLB’s 1st party data we could track audience receptivity towards campaigns and content on HLB owned assets like websites, campaign landing pages and buy buttons – in real time. Allowing us to identify applicants that had Personal Loans approved. What we found were two key audiences and sized them to understand the potential for HLB: 1) Employed individuals, motivated by a need to settle bills / other debts before the month end due date. 2) Sole proprietors / small businesses, motivated by a need to settle payments to their business partners, vendors, etc. These were “The Responsible” groups who seek credit facilities but demonstrate healthy repayment behavior. They were the perfect seam from which to mine our gold. To scale our reach, we generated lookalike audiences (discarding the high risk prospects who typically searched for “fast cash”, “no conditions”, etc.) Then we set to work on really reaching these golden prospects.

Execution
Smarter Targeting of Smart Borrowers For communications rollout, our earlier analytical work became invaluable. Because the digital behaviour of our target was tracked in real time, we could serve them creative specifically tailored to their interest and Personal Loan motivations So instead of activating a standard PL search campaign that is typically one dimensional with generic messaging focusing only on rates, we used a combination of standard text ads and responsive search ads to minimize the spillover. By harnessing the power Responsive Search Ads, we could zoom into the deeper consumer motivations of the two groups we’d identified. To ensure highest impressions and clicks to our website, we optimized our campaign by increasing our spends during the weekdays to capture people who were dropping lead during working hours. This allowed stake a claim in share of impression at a whopping 91% in the search space. For HLB, 90% of the search budget was allocated to a highly focused pool of top performing keywords that generated 80% of the leads.

Effectiveness
Above & Beyond Expectations Instead of spreading our budget across multiple channels and by smartly sharpening HLB search marketing strategy, we achieved the highest PL approval rate in three years. • Achieved an average approval rate of 25% (with a peak of 30%); This was 6% higher than the industry benchmark • Loan Application value went up by 102% (RM259M vs previous year RM128M) • Loan applications went up by 75% (7,613 vs previous year 4,344) • Loan amount disbursed increased by 98% (RM34.7 vs previous year RM17.5) By these metrics, we successfully exceeded the KPIs set at the onset of the campaign showing an insight based, data driven search marketing strategy could lead to a tangible edge in a competitive marketplace.