According to AXA Singapore marketing services and communications manager Jennifer Tan, the insurer — which appointed Grey Global Singapore as its first local creative agency this year — is aiming to strengthen its branding in a highly competitive space dominated by AIA and Great Eastern. "AXA Life does not currently enjoy a consistent brand recall. We are competing with other life insurance companies that have a longer history and larger sales force, hence we are always perceived as a small market player.
"Many consumers are not aware of our global strengths and accolades. In order to achieve our business goals of growth, we identified the need to build a recognisable and robust brand."
The campaign takes a bold, copy-driven approach that draws upon wit and consumer insight to spoof traditional insurance plans. According to Subba Raju, Grey Southeast Asia vice-president, "the strategy was to marry the medium and the message and deploy it at relevant touch points. Accordingly, ads in the financial district addressed retirement issues, ads near hospitals addressed protection issues and so on. The result is maximum exposure to a variety of executions that addressed different issues, but had the same underlying message — that AXA was the ideal partner who could help plan your future."
In one print ad that ran alongside a news story on Liverpool FC, the tagline read, 'The AXA 'You'll never walk alone' Plan'. A bus was painted to read, 'The AXA 'I don't want to be taking this to work when I'm 80' Plan'.
"The simplicity of the creative idea and contextual media planning overcame any budget constraint there was," Raju said. MediaCom handled media duties.
"The challenge was to convey our message without coming across as too serious or boring or even flippant," said Raju.
