Asia to drive Concert global ad campaign

Concert has kept its communications message as simple as ABC in its global advertising launch campaign, which broke at the end of January soon after its joint-venture partners secured regulatory approval. In a significant move for the region, the campaign was developed and will be driven out of Asia, as Concert - run as a "virtual corporation" - has based its advertising and brand management responsibilities in Hong Kong. Owned equally by AT&T and British Telecom, the new company said the campaign was deliberately kept simple to drive home the message that the JV was best positioned among global telecom alliances to simplify the delivery of global communications. "Our positioning is simplicity in communications, which is why we have chosen to start with the letters of the alphabet," said Concert vice-president for advertising and brand management, Jean Liu. "With Concert, communications is as simple as ABC." The alphabet-based campaign also allowed Concert to communicate its pedigree heritage, which Ms Liu said was a happy coincidence. Ms Liu said there was another advantage in keeping the launch message simple - "the campaign was easily adapted for our key markets around the world", she pointed out. The campaign broke in print and cyberspace in more than 20 countries throughout Asia, Europe and North America. Targeted at the world's largest corporate customers, carriers and Internet service providers, the ads appear in leading business publications, including The Economist, Fortune, Handlesblatt, Asahi Shimbun, The Wall Street Journal and The Financial Times. The print blitz will last four weeks, and will be supported by a six-week outdoor and a six to eight-week interactive campaign. Ms Liu said the Internet - despite its promise of personalised one-on-one interaction was the more difficult portion to execute. "We focused on sites frequented by IT executives and CEOs," Ms Liu said, adding that the wide scope of the Web made it difficult to narrow down the final selection. "With the Internet, there is also no data or empirical evidence to guide you." Young & Rubicam, which is AT&T's brand agency, developed the print campaign as Concert's agency of record. Y&R has allocated two sets of resources to service the AT&T and Concert accounts, with a "firewall between them". Despite having to coordinate input from around the world for the campaign's creation, Ms Liu said the development process - carried out over email and video conferencing - entailed minimum fuss, taking just four weeks from concept to execution. "We needed the best possible advertising partner, with world-class branding expertise and global reach, which is why we have chosen Young & Rubicam as our agency," said Ms Liu. The interactive portion of the campaign was handle by Modem Media Poppe Tyson.

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