Created by TBWA\Tequila, the campaign involves a logo redesign and a new slogan rolled out in TV and print.
The ‘1 Life. Live it’ tagline is to be replaced by ‘Brighter’, with the new positioning symbolised by sparklers adorning the new logo.
The ‘1 Life. Live it’ tagline is to be replaced by ‘Brighter’, with the new positioning symbolised by sparklers adorning the new logo.
“M1 tends to be the first to market with new innovations, such as Me TV. We wanted to distill that sense of innovation into the advertising,” said Graham Kelly, TBWA’s ECD.
“M1 has traditionally been seen as the plucky contender up against the incumbent giant, SingTel. We wanted to disrupt the category and refocus M1 as a sunnier, more approachable brand.”
The TVCs, directed by Thailand’s Suthon Petchsuwan, take the format of a comedy quiz show. In one, an Albert Einstein lookalike goes head- to-head with a team of squirrels to find out “who’s brighter?”.
The campaign includes a long-copy print ad, and one execution with the headline: ‘What the world needs now is something a little brighter’, in the company’s orange and yellow corporate colours.
“M1’s core audience has always been more youthful than that of its competitors,” said Kelly. “ ‘Brighter’ will help M1 drive its positioning as a more playful, exuberant brand.”
The campaign follows a modest recent earnings report from M1, which showed profits were up by 1.6 per cent year-on-year in the third quarter of 2007.
However, Kelly said the campaign was not a reaction to the company’s financial report.
M1’s weakness in the Singapore telco market is that it lacks fixed-line services with which to bundle its mobile and data services offering, according to analysts.