Telco Maxis drives ad recall with promo for pre-paid card

Malaysian mobile operator Maxis topped the list of most recalled commercials in Malaysia in April, with a recall rate of 89 per cent. According to Kristine Ong, general manager of Starcom Malaysia, Maxis is a consistently heavy advertiser. "It has always been one of the top 10 advertisers in Malaysia. As a result, it's not surprising that it is top of mind," she said. For April, Nielsen Media Research recorded that Maxis spent over RM6.1 million (US$1.6 million) in print and television advertising. It has heavy rotation on the airwaves as it pushes its prepaid Hotlink cards -- with a competition offering three Mercedes Benz CLK 200 K Cabriolet cars as prizes. In addition, Maxis tied up with the upcoming Euro 2004 campaign to push its prepaid cards with related ringtones, screensavers, wallpapers, logos, picture messages and games. It also has an SMS contest currently running, offering the grand prize of RM 20,000. That contest runs until the end of May. In second place was satellite television network Astro, with a recall rate of 87 per cent. Astro is running a branding campaign where it promotes the benefits of a multi-channel broadcasting service where consumers can pick from a wide spectrum of programmes. Said Goh Seow Eng, director of sales and marketing at Astro: "We at Astro adopt a consumer-centric approach to campaign development; that is, getting the basic fundamental elements in an ad creation right. "We continuously strive to ensure that our brand proposition is communicated in a relevant, engaging and non-intrusive way to ensure memorability."