FOCUS: AGENCY OF THE YEAR AWARDS 2000 - Best Use of Media - OMD dreams up a moveable feast for Sunday

WINNER Category: Best Use of Media Client: Sunday Campaign: Saltimbanco MTR Journey Media agency: Optimum Media Direction Applauded by spectators all over the world and described by Time magazine as "the greatest show on Earth", Cirque du Soleil's Saltimbanco premiered in Hong Kong in January this year. The show was a 2.5-hour extravaganza of acrobatics and theatrical artistry, full of energy and optimism, and vastly different from traditional circus performances. As such, Hong Kong mobile phone network service provider Sunday decided to take advantage of this event opportunity for its first promotional blitz for the new millennium, with an aim to reinforce its distinctive brand personality - fun, exciting, dynamic, bold, innovative. However, Sunday was only one of the official sponsors of this magnificent spectacle; others included Hang Seng Bank and the Swire Group. With a view to break free from the advertising clutter, the client called for an unprecedented media idea which would put Sunday/ Saltimbanco at the forefront of awareness of every person in Hong Kong, as well as arouse maximum interest in the show. The client also requested a minimum three-month campaign to sustain the ticket booking period. Faced with these challenges, the team from Optimum Media Direction needed to devise a creative media idea and executions which would best manifest Sunday's image and make it the most talked-about brand in town during the event. In the absence of any concrete creative concept, the campaign was almost entirely media-driven. The media idea Although television and print were deemed necessary to ensure mass awareness, both were being used by all the other event sponsors. In view of this, OMD proposed an idea which had never before been attempted on a major transport medium, and through which the general public would be involved on a day-to-day basis. The concept which the media agency developed would run in Hong Kong's underground railway network. The Sunday/Saltimbanco MTR Journey concept gave the client ubiquitous advertising dominance in MTR stations and trains. The idea was to transform the everyday journey of each MTR passenger from a mundane, routine activity into an enlivening and exciting experience. OMD claims to have "re-invented the wheel" of MTR advertising and created a range of different forms of new media options to showcase a panoply of characters and acts from Saltimbanco. Almost every available centimetre of space in the selected MTR stations and trains was utilised to maximise the opportunity to see. For each media option, specific characters performing acts best fitted with the particular physical environment were featured. In other words, by the time the commuter had walked through the station and boarded the train, he or she would have been cheered, amused and entertained by various members of the Saltimbanco troupe, including jugglers, clowns and acrobats. The implementation of the idea was challenging. With no prior precedents to look to, it took OMD nearly a month to negotiate what it described as an "unbeatable deal" with Pearl & Dean, the media representative which handles MTR advertising. This was on top of dealing with the many different concerns, objections and restrictions imposed by the MTR Corporation before it would give the green light for the project to go ahead. The creative execution In pursuit of maximum creative/media synergy, the media team was also heavily involved in the creative development process. The team conducted site visits to the MTR stations with BBDO's creative people and the client, so as to identify all possible means of advertising at the concourse, platform, corridor and inside the train carriages. Once final approval had been obtained from the MTRC, all parties worked together to select the most suitable images from the Saltimbanco show for the various media options, thereby making the visual impact of every performer and act come alive. This included: - Station pillars - Wall posters - Train door windows - Train windows above the seats - Seat backs - Handrails/poles - Train ceilings The media campaign The campaign ran from late 1999 to January 2000, lasting for three months. Posters were featured on pillars and walls in 12 key MTR stations, and a total of 38 trains were used for interior decoration. In order to ensure that Sunday was the dominant advertiser over the period of the campaign, OMD secured product exclusivity. This effectively meant that Pearl & Dean did not accept bookings from any other mobile phone, IDD and ISP advertisers for any unconventional media projects during the three-month Sunday/Saltimbanco campaign period. The results The campaign was deemed a huge success, with each of the parties involved becoming a winner in their own right: - Sunday achieved the highest recall among all sponsors during testing. Despite the fact that the Swire Group was actually the title sponsor of Saltimbanco, many people came to believe that Sunday was the major or even sole sponsor of the show. - There was much hype and hysteria generated in terms of publicity, media coverage and word-of-mouth. Some commuters even referred to the selected MTR stations featuring the campaign as 'Saltimbanco stations'. - Cirque du Soleil received an overwhelming response in terms of ticket bookings and over-delivered on its business target of acquiring 200,000 attendees. - Following the campaign, Pearl & Deal received numerous enquiries from other advertisers. In response, the company introduced a special rate card for all the media options used by OMD, thereby creating a new source of revenue. - OMD has also been approached by other advertisers as a result of its work for Sunday/ Saltimbanco. - BBDO, which won the Sunday advertising account in late 1997, has also been honoured with the Asian Ad Campaign of the Year 2000 title for its ongoing creative campaigns for this client - see story on page 36 of this issue.

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