The Association of Accredited Advertising Agents Malaysia (4As) has unveiled scholarships programmes to provide up-to-date information and resources about the world of advertising and marketing. The scholarship is introduced for the second consecutive year, and is offered to professionals working at 4As member agencies.
In addition, this scholarship also provides the professionals an opportunity to quality for the IPA Foundation Certicate awarded by Chartered Institute of Practitioners in Advertising (IPA). For 2018, 4As will be boosting the number of IPA scholarships on offer to a total value of over RM124,000.
According to Andrew Lee, president of 4As, the scholarships on offer are part of its commitment to raise industry standards and professionalism by fostering continuous professional development within the industry. This is also one of the key objectives of 4A.
“We hope that industry practitioners, especially entry-level executives, will take advantage of this benefit provided by the 4As to hone their skills,” Lee added.
“The IPA Foundation Certificate provides a benchmark in best practice learning that is internationally recognised, augmenting on-the-job learning, induction programmes and training courses. With the industry evolving at such a rapid pace, there is a not only a need to acquaint new industry professionals with up-to-date best practice, but to future-proof the calibre of our talent by way of inspiring creative and critical thinking,” Khairudin Rahim, CEO of 4As CEO said.
Topics covered by the IPA Foundation Certificate include Artificial Intelligence (AI), Augmented Reality (AR), and programmatic buying. Learning modules will be provided online, through a mobile optimised platform for the delivery of webinars, podcast, expert opinion videos and interactive content. This allows course participants to the information at all times for continuous learning.
New course materials are updated annually and written by renowned UK-based clients and advertising practitioners, including Ben Johnson of Unilever, Debs Gerrard of Iris, and Emerson Bramwell of Vizeum.
Singtel, together with its mobile associates Globe and Telkomsel has inked a deal with ONE Championship to deliver martial arts-related content and other digital assets to customers across Asia.
The deal was announced alongside the launch of ONE Championship's mobile app, which offers live and recorded telecasts of martial arts matches and events, in Singtel's newly-revamped flagship store. The collaboration will see both companies integrating the Singtel Group's mobile wallets and carried billing services to power e-commerce functions in the recently launched ONE Championship app. Both companies are also planning to produce original content jointly.
According to Arthur Lang, CEO of International Group at Singtel, delivering content, particularly premium sports content, over its advanced network is one of the key pillars of its consumer strategy. Sports content is a big winner with its consumers, with Millennials comprising a large part of its customer base.
“We are excited to collaborate with ONE Championship to bring new entertainment offerings such as martial arts to our customers while raising the profile of the martial arts community here. This is why we will also be exploring ways to develop and deliver exclusive martial arts content to not just customers in Singapore and Australia but also our regional associates in Thailand, the Philippines, Indonesia and India," Lang added.
“ONE Championship is focused on bringing the unique action and adrenaline of our live ONE Championship events, straight to our audience on all platforms, making sure that millions of martial arts fans around the world have access to our digital content. I am excited to work with Singtel in executing this vision, delivering the unique experience of Asian martial arts to the world,” Chatri Sityodtong, CEO of ONE Championship said.
Revlon has launched a review for its global media business, one which sees agencies such as Omnicom’s OMD, IPG Mediabrand’s Initiative and Havas vying for the account. Incumbent MediaCom will not be taking part in the review. Both parties confirmed the move.
In an Adweek report, a Revlon spokesperson said that the brand had decided to review its media business as part of its ongoing efforts to enhance business operations and drive growth.
“We appreciate MediaCom for their service of these past years, but at this time we have decided to go in a different direction,” the statement to Adweek added. Marketing has reached out to Revlon for comment. In a statement to Marketing, a MediaCom spokesperson confirmed that on 23 March 2018, Revlon had informed the agency of its intent to begin a media review. The agency responded in 24 hours that it would not be participating.
“We thank Revlon for the opportunity to help grow its global brands over the past seven years and wish them well,” the MediaCom spokesperson added.
The move comes nearly one year after the cosmetics brand consolidated its global ad business with WPP, naming Grey its creative partner while retaining MediaCom for media planning and buying. Previously, the account was split with Publicis. The move saw Grey providing integrated communications services including traditional and digital advertising, as well as promotion and activation marketing, globally and throughout Asia Pacific. This extends to Revlon’s portfolio of brands such as Elizabeth Arden, Elizabeth Taylor, Revlon and Cutex.
Revlon is one of the latest clients to review its agency business with WPP. Just two weeks ago, another WPP client Ford Motor Company revealed that it has put its US$4 billion creative account up for review, after almost 75 years working together.
Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak (pictured) has planned for 18 new initiatives to help raise the standard of living in Langkawi island to "a greater level".
According to Bernama, the initiatives will help develop the tourism industry, but also offer the island's business, public infrastructure, lifestyle and recreation with more opportunities. Meanwhile, PM Najib said that a Chinese company will collaborate with Tourism Malaysia to produce 40 promotional videos on Langkawi, which will be viewed by consumers in both countries. Approximately RM25,000 to RM250,000 has been allocated by SME Bank to finance Langkawi traders operating chalets, motels and retail outlets, totalling RM100 million.
The PM added a grant of RM5,000 each will be given to 1,000 small traders beginning 1 June 2018. Additionally, the Bumiputera Agenda Steering Unit (TERAJU) will also set aside funds to finance small businesses. The funds will come in the form of grants of up to RM10,000 to 200 entrepreneurs.
Meanwhile, the government will also allocate RM12 million to empower the Langkawi Tourism Academy, as well as develop a business hub at Pantai Chenang based on the Chatuchak market in Bangkok, Thailand. A private sector investment of RM200 million will also allow a premium outlet to be built in Langkawi, along with a private hospital as a health tourism attraction. Additionally, a motocross circuit will be built in Langkawi, and efforts will also be made to boost the tourism segment of meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions on the island.
The Langkawi International Airport, which is currently being expanded and has the ability to accommodate three million tourists a year, is expected to complete in September 2018. PM Najib added that the government is formulating a strategy to attract foreign airlines to launch direct flights.
Also, the Malaysian Digital Economy Corporation will tie-up with the Malaysian Malay Chamber of Commerce to train 1,000 digital entrepreneurs in Langkawi until the end of 2018. An urban transformation centre was also set up on the island to allow the acceleration of permits and licence approval matters.
Saatchi & Saatchi Greater China has announced that Wong Wai (Joe) has joined as executive creative director of South China to further reinforce Saatchi & Saatchi’s creative capability and industrial influence in the region. Joe will report to Fan Ng, chief creative officer of Greater China. The agency’s previous ECD Paul Ho has moved onto a new role as Publicis Communications ECD, Shopper.
With 18 years of experience in the industry, Wong has driven growth for international brands in Greater China which include Shangri-La, Mercedes Benz, HSBC, Nike, Carlsberg, Rolex, Wanda, Tencent Internet+ and many others, and has been awarded with over 100 awards internationally and locally. Before his stint at McCann & Spencer, Wong worked as ECD for DDB Group Beijing.
Ng commented, "Joe is one of a few elite creative talents. I have known him for almost two decades and we had a wonderful partnership back then. I am very excited to have him on my team. With his background in Hong Kong and expertise in the China market, I am sure we will keep moving forward and continuously improve our professional creative services.”
“4As is not dying. It’s however important to be professional enough to create value for our brand and clients with agility,” Wong said, “I am very happy and lucky to have a chance to work with a promising team mixed with exceptional advertising experts with rich Greater China experience. I can’t wait to collaborate with them to take Saatchi & Saatchi South China to the next level.”
Wong will work closely with South China Group MD Alexis Chiu to grow South China and oversee creative output, while previous ECD Paul Ho, who takes the role as Publicis Communications ECD, Shopper, will switch focus to shopper marketing and activation.
Reuter Communications has won the China communications retainer for global luxury fashion technology platform, Farfetch.
The luxury marketing and communications agency will oversee strategic communications in China to develop and raise the profile of Farfetch as the innovator and leader in luxury fashion technology and its consumer marketplace, farfetch.com. The agency will be responsible for media strategy, launches, public relations, influencer and celebrity marketing and engagement, and event management.
Nick Cakebread, managing partner, Reuter Communications said: “Farfetch is the world’s most innovative company in luxury fashion. We’re delighted to be working with them to bring its love of fashion to Chinese audiences through innovative and creative campaigns both online and offline.”
Founded by Portuguese entrepreneur José Neves in 2007 and launched in 2008, Farfetch was launched as an e-commerce marketplace for luxury boutiques around the world. Farfetch has since evolved into a platform for the luxury industry, connecting customers in over 190 countries with items from over 880 boutiques and brands from over 40 countries.
When it comes to the season of gifting, it is no surprise that brands are fighting hard for a consumer's attention, and their dollars. Taking it one step further was The Body Shop, which took hold of the occasion to launch its #PlayforPeace campaign to benefit refugee children in Syria.
To show that it was more than just a brand which sold shower gels, the brand sought after younger audiences, in a bid to connect with them and stay relevant. Not only did this help to increase sales, it also drove footfall to its stores.
This post was done in conjunction with Starcom.
Christmas is the peak season for gifting and The Body Shop hosted a special #PlayforPeace campaign with its Christmas collection. For every gift bought from the seasonal gift collection, The Body Shop made a donation to International Alerts Play for Peace Project. The project provides fun activities and a safe place for Syrian refugee children to play for a year. Additionally, The Body Shop’s Play for Peace Christmas collection is packaged in eye-catching festive packaging, with the gift boxes doubles up as fun games.
Campaign objectives
1. Build top-of-mind awareness that The Body Shop is the ultimate place to shop for Christmas gifts.
2. Drive Christmas sales in store and online (Lazada store)
The Body Shop’s Play for Peace Christmas collection is packaged with gift boxes while doubling up as fun games. The Body Shop needed to own Christmas shopping and find ways to appeal to younger audiences. As such, it saw the opportunity of moving away from buying Christmas gifts to giving people gifts of play.
The experience design was based on "Kidulting – children plays, adult plays too!" where the brand re-imagined playful technology, audience data and content to engage consumer in their shopping journey. Its playable ads resulted high engagement rate at 25% and drove business outcomes - stores footfall increased by 10% and like-for-like sales improved by 7% over Christmas (versus 2016).
Challenge
The Body Shop is perceived as old, with their core audience observed to be mothers. Within the beauty and skincare category, The Body Shop is sandwiched between the local brands, Korean brands and is also competing with other global brands such as L’Occitane and Crabtree & Evelyn.
With influx of Korean brands such as Innisfree, LANEIGE claiming The Body Shop’s unique selling proposition (natural ingredients) and a slew of local brands stealing market share, The Body Shop needed to own Christmas shopping and find ways to appeal to younger audience to stay relevant and show them that it is more than just body lotions and shower gels.
Every user experience has different mileage with different beauty and skincare product, and this fuels their drive to try different product for a shot at a beauty product that fits their need. Over time, they became discerning purchaser and brands need to work harder than recommending them the “newest and latest”. While beauty and skincare is a popular gifting idea during Christmas period, its audience wants to give a gift that is thoughtful and fun.
Strategy and execution
The company's human experience strategy anchored on the opportunity of shifting away from buying Christmas gifts to giving people gifts of play. The experience design, "Kidulting – children play, adult play too!" facilitated re-imagined playful technology, audience data and content to engage consumer in their shopping journey (amplifying play in all ad assets across digital consumer journey). As such, it pursued Play with:
1. Content – making content playful for youth and meaningful for adults
It partnered with editors from three popular millennial online publishers, namely SGAG, Mothership and AsiaOne, to drive the “play” message prompting our audience to the stores
2. Technology via NexTechNow – amplify "Play" to drive purchase opportunity
Audience segments were created using third party data (Bluekai, Oracle, eXelate, etc.) to ensure it covered verticals from multiple group such as Category (Beauty), Psychographics (Self pampering, gifting), Recent Online Shopper (Mastercard, Retail), Competitors (L'Occitane, etc.).
Brand discovery is differentiated from competitors via Impactful Ad format to drive footfall (sensory engagement mobile units and engaging skins versions) that allowed its audience to “play” and get store discount vouchers.
Drove relevance and purchase immediacy with ad unit that worked as an interactive aisle (browse, click to purchase on e-store).
It also tapped two biggest consumer sales event – Black Friday and 12.12 to drive awareness for Gift of Play only to uncover unique The Body Shop shoppers’ behaviour. In small geographical markets such as Singapore, digital ads don’t drive immediate conversion, especially for gifting, but instead drove immediate retail footfall. Consumers preferred to visit the stores to try and then purchase the product, rather than opting for shipping which will take days.
Results
This campaign validated that putting “play” into our messaging and ad units differentiated the unique consumer journey that worked well for The Body Shop. Our playable ads resulted high engagement rate at 25%. The audience segmenting backed by data helped the brand approach different audience segments and served them relevant ad for a deeper engagement. More importantly, the campaign drove business outcomes:
Stores footfall increased by 10% increase over Christmas (versus 2016)
Sales improvement of like-for-like sales by 7% over Christmas (versus 2016)
For Adludio, it engage consumer via mini playable ads that focus driving mobile interaction, i.e. duck and dive mobile games – Play the game (interact) and get discount voucher for duck and dive product. These ad formats are also build according to different Body Shop products targeting family, couples and females separately.
Content to amplify campaign and trigger emotional response
To amplify the campaign, it partnered SGAG, Mothership and AsiaOne - the top publishers when it came to our target audience and their role is to help amplify campaign and provide editors’ point-of-view on the product.
According to Bloomberg sources, India e-commerce company Flipkart has agreed to sell 75% of its company to Walmart Inc for US$15 billion in a move towards regional expansion. The Bloomberg report added that Google-parent company Alphabet Inc is also likely participating in the investment with Walmart. This is said to be worth approximately US$15 billion.
Meanwhile, existing shareholders Tencent Holdings, Naspers and Microsoft are expected to retain small stakes. However, SoftBank Group Corp selling its over 20% stake in the business, valued at around US$20 billion, the report added.
Marketing has reached out to Flipkart, Walmart, SoftBank and Google for comment.
Many say the latest move by Walmart is a move to bring its war with Amazon into international markets. Up until now much of its battle has been in the US with Walmart building up its e-commerce capabilities. It is rumoured that Amazon too wanted to buy into Flipkart in an approximately 60% stake deal.
Other than India, China too has been big on both Amazon and Walmart's plans. Last year, Walmart revealed its China expansion plans, which includes opening 30 to 40 new stores and remodelling 50 existing stores.
Unfortunately, Alibaba remains the undisputed leader in the market with the world’s largest retail platform and its total trading volume online in the fiscal year ending in March 2016 surpassing Walmart’s annual sales.
Most recently, Walmart combined Sainsbury and its wholly owned UK retail subsidiary Asda Group. This saw Walmart holding a 42% share of the combined business, while 29.9% will be made up of Sainsbury’s ordinary shares. According to another Bloomberg report, the move signals a strategy towards faster-growing markets over Walmart’s mature ones.
Gushcloud International has invested into Summer Beauty House, a beauty space which supports beauty creators and communities’ workshops and activities. Together with two other investors, the total investment is worth US$1 million. Marketing has reached out to Gushcloud for additional details.
The move marks Gushcloud International’s first move into the beauty space. Through the partnership, the company aims to build the largest beauty creator and community in Indonesia. Summer Beauty House will also work with cosmetic brands and makeup artistes to create more experiential workshops and events in Indonesia to further educate the beauty community. It has also launched an internal studios arm called Summer Studios to work with top celebrities to co-create and build beauty-focused YouTube Channels and video content.
In addition, Summer Beauty House will also be investing in and co-creating beauty products and lines with top beauty creators and influencers. In Indonesia, it is creating an eye palette with beauty creators such as Cindercella (@cindercella) and Vinna Gracia (@vinnagracia), who hold a collective reach of more than 1 million followers in Indonesia.
Althea Lim, co-CEO of Gushcloud International, said in a statement that with the investment into Summer Beauty House, made alongside venture capitalists such as Merah Cipta Media, the company aims to help develop sustainable careers for its beauty influencers and creators. This is by creating personal beauty brands with and for them.
“Indonesia is one of our key markets, and we are very excited to be part of this meaning journey with the Summer team, building an impact towards Indonesia. Alongside Summer, we will also be helping global beauty influencers and creators to penetrate the Indonesian market,” Lim said.
Kuik Xiaoshi, co-founder and CEO of Summer International, said that through the partnership, the company aims to quickly work with the top global beauty creators and influencers under the Gushcloud roster to invest and co-create more consumer products around them. She added that Indonesia will be its stepping stone as it eyes the China and Latin America markets within the next 18 months.
“With the investment from Gushcloud, we believe that Summer will be able to leverage on the key relationships and networks that Gushcloud has built in the various countries.
Most recently, Gushcloud International and YAN Digital entered into a new joint venture called GY Entertainment, to create a new influencer management and marketing company in Vietnam. YAV Digital is the digital arm of YAN Media Group, a youth entertainment multi-media company based in Vietnam.
In October last year, Gushcloud International secured a US$3 million funding led by YG Investment, the investment arm under South Korean music label and entertainment agency YG Group. This was to strengthen the group and expand into larger markets within Southeast Asia such as Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam.
Meanwhile in July 2017, it reorganised its global business into two business groups – Gushcloud Entertainment and Gushcloud Agency. The move saw Ng Siang Hiang assume the role of CEO of Gushcloud Agency, taking over from Lim. Both groups are housed under Gushcloud’s holding company brand Gushcloud International.
Earlier in March 2017, it acquired uFluencer Group, a US-based social media talent management agency, representing influencers and beauty content creators globally. The acquisition is 100% and marked the second time the influencer agency was making a move into the US market.
iPrice Group, a product discovery and price comparison platform, raised a new round of funding from LINE Ventures, with participation from Cento Ventures and Venturra. While the company declined to comment on the sum of the investment, it did concur the amount will be used to double down on the investment in the Indonesian market and keep on improving the user experience, especially in the verticals of fashion and electronics.
In a press statement, iPrice claims to be on track to reaching more than 150 million visitors this year, driven by the accelerating growth experienced in Indonesia – its electronics segment in particular – which grew 30 times in the past 12 months. The fragmentation of the ecommerce market and the increasing online savviness of Indonesians shoppers are fuelling iPrice’s hyper-growth.
To support its next phase of growth, the Kuala Lumpur-based company has recently reorganised its business, creating three different business units (electronics, fashion and commercial content), allowing it to serve its customers with the best possible user experience.
According to the company, since the last funding one and a half years ago, more than 50 million online shoppers visited iPrice, which expanded in the same period its product catalogue from few dozens of millions to over 500 million SKUs across their seven markets Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam, and Hong Kong. David Chmelar, iPrice Group CEO, said the company is 100% focused on its seven markets at the moment, given how much growth we still have ahead of us.
“It's really Day 1 for us and for the whole ecommerce market in SEA. Just consider that the ecommerce market in SEA doubled in size in the past two years from US$5b to US$10b and is expected to reach U$90bn in 2025 as per last Google-Temasek study. What excites us is that this is only the beginning of our journey. To provide a perspective, in the Czech Republic, the country where I am from, everyone visits the leading price comparison platform, Heureka, twice per month. With already more than 300M monthly active users in the region and 100,000 people coming online EACH DAY for the first time, it’s easy to see the historical opportunity we have ahead of us,” Chmelar added.
Beyond the rapid growth of its user metrics over the past 12 months, iPrice has been able to secure strategic B2B partnerships with some of the biggest media groups and brands in the region by offering them tailored affiliate solutions. Among them are Mediacorp in Singapore, Thairath in Thailand and Samsung in Indonesia.
iPrice has also been cementing its thought leadership position in the e-commerce field with studies such as their State of eCommerce in Southeast Asia, which has become the primary source of data-driven ecommerce information in the region.
“iPrice, which is riding the explosive growth of e-commerce in Southeast Asia, has the most promising team with the right talents, technology, and operational excellence in the region. In turn, they will become the first destination in the online shopping journey in Southeast Asia” June Cha, general manager of LINE Ventures, said.
Design firm Edenspiekermann rebrands Singapore’s co-working community, The Hub Singapore, to Found. According to a press statement, the meaning behind the name “Found.” signals both a journey and a goal. Primarily, it means a place of belonging, no matter which part of the journey one is on.
The Singapore Edenspiekermann team worked closely with the team behind Impact Hub Singapore to develop the brand strategy, name, logo and visual identity for the new brand, in line with the company’s decision to leave the global Impact Hub network and desire to further scale their operations and reach into the region.
The new logo was founded on the idea of connecting the dots. Two inverse dots – inside the ’o’ and the ‘d’ – are complemented by two solid dots of the same size – inside the ‘F’ and the full stop. On and off; yin and yang; lost and Found. The full stop at the end also grounds the journey of the Found.ers — this is where they belong. Found.’s colour palette comprises a fresh teal against a bold indigo blue, punctuated with red as an accent colour: an homage to Singapore – the little red dot – where Found.’s roots lie.
Edo van Dijk, CEO of Edenspiekermann Singapore, said the new brand positioning and identity created show courage and a clear vision for the future.
Grace Sai, founder and CEO of Found., added, “It was important for us that our new brand reflected our ambition and vision in building the best network of innovation studios across the SEA region. It needed to capture the essence of being in the Found.community - of courage, collaboration and a fierce passion in creating change in the world. We feel that Edenspiekermann has successfully captured that and more.”
Besides it being a building space and supporting co-working communities, Found. is a network of innovation studios where entrepreneurs and corporates can find coaching, expertise, and partners to "create future-ready solutions".
Karaoke streaming system Popsical has appointed Happy Marketer as its social media partner, in efforts to strengthen its digital domain presence. Happy Marketer will handle both strategy and management across the social media platforms, as well as performance marketing aimed at increasing the market share for the product.
Popsical’s marketing director, Khairah Rahim said that the collaboration with Happy Marketer is expected to enhance the company’s social media presence, to make it more a more engaging and lively digital presence to raise awareness and drive conversions.
Happy Marketer tells Marketing that this new partnership is set for six months and work is expected to roll out from June this year.
Prantik Mazumdar, managing partner at Happy Marketer said, “Digital has completely transformed the way we create and consume music, and social media as a platform lends itself very well to share and curate music preferences. With this in mind, we are excited to work with Popsical to make the Karaoke experience as fun and engaging as possible via social media channels to help the company create more interaction and interest in the local community.”
Radisson Hotel Group has appointed Accenture Interactive as its global experience agency, to increase the digital presence of its brands and hotels, and transform the digital experience to improve customer acquisition and retention.
Accenture Interactive will offer digital marketing services for Radisson Collection, Radisson Blu, Radisson, Radisson RED, Park Inn by Radisson and Country Inn & Suites by Radisson, covering more than 1,100 hotels in operations across 80 countries. These include Indonesia, China, the Philippines and Thailand. The agency will leverage the hospitality expertise of Accenture's Travel Industry Group, and apply technology and data for personalised and targeted campaigns across all digital channels. It will also curate unique tailored content in a bid to increase qualified traffic to drive new business for the group. Accenture Interactive has also helped the group create a chatbot designed especially for meeting and events planners.
Remy Merckx, VP digital, Radisson Hotel Group, said the group is striving to differentiate itself from the rest through personalised and meaningful experiences, making every moment matter for its guests.
Anatoly Roytman, senior MD, Europe, Africa, Middle East and Latin America lead and global commerce offering lead, said the agency can offer a new approach to build creative digital campaigns, as well as a solid channel strategy to raise brand equity, revenue growth and customer love.
"Taking a holistic approach to data, creativity and marketing technologies means we can support Radisson Hotel Group to deliver market-leading digital campaigns," he added.
This, by no means is Accenture Interactive's, first big global client. Last year, Maserati also appointed Accenture Interactive for global experience duties to boost its customer experience across digital channel. Recently, Accenture acquired New York-based digital agency Meredith Xcelerated Marketing (MXM), which focuses on integrated marketing, cross-channel strategy development and creative execution. MXM has experience in bringing together high-performing content, customer data, marketing strategy and creative development to drive business impact for highly recognisable brands.
Meanwhile, Accenture recorded a net revenue of US$9.6 billion for the second quarter of 2018 (Q2 18) ended 28 February 2018. Its growth markets, which include Asia Pacific and Middle East, witnessed growth from US$1.52 billion to US$1.82 billion in Q2 18, while North America posted a revenue of US$4.28 billion, compared with US$3.96 billion during the same period last year.
In 2017, the company launched a digital hub in Singapore, a move supported by the Singapore Economic Development Board. The hub aims to aid clients in the region to develop and apply disruptive solutions to help transform their businesses in view of today’s digital economy. It also appointed former CTO of Telekom Malaysia Giorgio Migliarina as communications and media industry lead for Asia Pacific last year.
Circles.Life has stamped a deal with EZ-Link to offer the first integrated digital experience for transit-telco products, utilising digital rewards as incentives. The move, starting end May 2018, follows Circles.Life's shift towards integrated service options.
This sees the Circles.Life offering customers 100MB for every 10 rides when using EZ-Link on public transport, and an addition 1GB monthly for linking their Circles.Life number with the EZ-Link account through the EZ-Link app.
The partnership also aims to provide constant connectivity and integrate people's lifestyle into one platform. According to Abhishek Gupta, Co-Founder of Circles.Life, the telco believes that innovation should be applied in all sectors, and the only way to achieve this is by developing partnerships and using that as a unique differentiator in the telco space.
“As the only fully digital telco in Singapore, we aim to digitize the nation one vertical at a time, and be part of the smart nation plan. In the long run, we aim to open our platform to more verticals and be fully part of the government’s smart nation plan,” Abhishek said.
“EZ-Link constantly seeks collaborations that will make everyday usage of EZ-Link a rewarding experience. We hope that our users will have enhanced experience in our upcoming campaign with Circles.Life via our EZ-Link App,” Nicholas Lee, CEO of EZ-Link added.
Previously in the transit vertical, Circles.Life had also partnered with oBike to offer riders a VIP membership upon checkout with Circles.Line, using a specially curated code "OBIKECIRCLES". In addition, the telco had partnered with DBS Bank to bring digital convenience of getting an instant data boost using DBS reward points.
Hong Kong's iconic ifc mall has appointed Sinclair to lead its PR and communications strategy. The waterfront icon is home to a unique combination of high-end retail, restaurants and bars, entertainment outlets and one of the city’s premier hotels, Four Seasons Hotel, located in the prominent International Finance Center skyscraper.
The press release outlined that Sinclair will work with ifc mall to strengthen and maintain top-of-mind awareness among media, influencers and a discerning consumer base through maximising exposure of the mall’s offerings and marketing campaigns to drive quality footfall. Sinclair will also engage in a strategic influencer outreach programme to generate content on behalf of the mall, and devise and implement strategy for media and VIP events.
“ifc mall is an international destination, and we are delighted to be in partnership with them,” says Kiri Sinclair, Founder and Managing Director of Sinclair. “We look forward to working with ifc mall through providing strategic counsel, devising and implementing a targeted media and influencer engagement programme and showcasing our adept event management skills to reinforce their premium lifestyle experience and to drive quality visitation to one of the world’s most iconic lifestyle destinations.”
According to the latest Ipsos Media Atlas readership survey, all seven major publications of Sing Tao News Corporation (STNC) recorded readership growth, with the Headline Daily notching up a new high of 1.25mil readership. In face of keen competition in the media market, the group has succeeded in maintaining its popularity and mainstream status with its professional approach, quality content, and strategic positioning.
The group’s wide range of titles spreads across the mass media to vertical and premium segments, covering education and parents, recruitment and management, and more, while its major readership covers the middle to upper classes.
To highlight its outstanding performance across the board, STNC recently launched a series of branding campaigns which has achieved good impact and received positive feedback. Meanwhile, it has further extended its competitive edge and bolstered market awareness of its well-established multiple and vertical digital platforms. The Group shows the market its dedication in providing online to offline (O2O) complete solutions tailored to marketers’ needs.
For instance, in addition to leading digital players like Bastillepost, Ohpama, Headline Jetso App, the group also offers a full range of quality digital and social platforms, like ArtCan, Cars, Sing Tao education and property web and app, including the newly launched Smart Parents Popnews Channel, and more. Furthermore, the group has set up a new digital marketing company, Shimba, early last year, to provide one-stop marketing solutions with multi-platform access and comprehensive print-to-digital services.
This article was brought to you by Sing Tao News Corporation.
The revelation was made following Grab’s recent expansion of its vehicle service suite, which coincides with the launch of three new services GrabAssist, GrabCar and GrabFamily.
Despite Grab's acquisition of Uber, the ride-sharing market is a competitive one with local carpooling firm Ryde revealing plans to launch a new private-hire car service as part of its expansion strategy in March. In April, India-based Jungnoo also revealed plans to enter Singapore. Meanwhile, earlier this week Filo Technologies said it was launching private-car hire services in two weeks.
Meanwhile, the biggest rumour in the market came in late last month when local taxi operator ComfortDelGro was tipped to be in talks with GO-JEK for a tie-up to enter the Singapore market. Most recently, ComfortDelGro Taxi CEO Ang Wei Neng, said that the company has seen more drivers switching from private hire cars as they had found “driving taxis relatively more stable”. This came on the back of announcements that the taxi company had put in an order for 200 new taxi vehicles.
While customers, no doubt, have gotten accustomed to competitive pricing and promotions in this space, this begs the question, has Grab established a strong enough brand strategy to go without incentives?
According to Nick Foley, president of Southeast Asia Pacific and Japan at Landor the brand is able to afford such a move, not because of brand equity, but rather because it is the only player in this town.
"Uber is yesterday’s ride on the streets of the Lion City. ComfortDelGro is now having to reassess its strategy owing to the short lived alliance with Uber. For Grab, the company should make hay while the sun shines," he said. He added that building brand equity right now should be the strategy for Grab right now. However, the challenge is that both Grab and Uber conditioned the Singaporeans to extraordinarily cheap rides for a sustained period of time. He added:
It is easy to take prices down, but restoring value in a discount driven market requires the brand to the heavy lifting.
As Grab is the market leader in Singapore, Foley said "the brand should be applauded for taking a stand on a price war." Given that the brand has also done a fair job of making its brand visible, it now needs to ensure that its brand stands for more than cheap rides, Foley said.
"If it doesn’t, it will be difficult for the company to be commercially viable in the long term. Ultimately no one will win from another price shoot out on the streets of Singapore. The quality of ride sharing will only suffer, drivers will be put under a level of pressure that may lead to unsafe practices and the standard of vehicles will decline," he said.
When asked about the GrabRewards loyalty programme, Foley calls it "simply another transactional move" aimed at presenting Grab in a competitve and nimble light.
"The company is caught in a transactional spiral that fails to address how Grab can respond to higher order needs amongst its customers. There’s nothing wrong with its app, but such mobile points of connection are now table-stakes for this category," he said.
Meanwhile, Yvonne Low, former marketer at McDonald's and senior consultant at QED Consulting said the biggest and most powerful brands were not built on price discounts. Rather, they were built on fulfilling both functional and emotional needs of a consumer.
"Grab needs to deploy the relevant consumer levers that keeps the Grab brand top-of-mind and ensures it continues to stays focused on what it sets out to do - providing a hassle free, convenient, affordable and enjoyable ride experience to the users of its app service," she said.
She lauded the brand saying that despite it being a relatively young brand in the market, it has definitely achieved strong brand awareness and usage with Singaporeans in the past years. However, she said the brand has only established "moderate brand equity with Singaporeans" and therefore will still need to provide some incentives to maintain its market share.
"As a challenger brand it went about grabbing market share through the deployment of heavy rider promo discounts and driver incentives at the same time tried to build brand equity in other ways through non-price digital and integrated marketing efforts," she said.
Now, to grow it’s business and improve brand equity it will need to quickly implement a strong strategic growth plan and other brand levers beyond incentives.
Ivan Ng (pictured), director of social and content for Mirum’s The Social Team, has left the company after more than three years in the role.
During his time at Mirum, Ng was responsible for a team which focuses on the creation and execution of social media content, campaigns, analytics and services. He was also in charge of developing social concepts and providing communication solutions in all phases of a program. He has worked on both global and regional brands as well.
During his stint with Mirum, Ng has executed social strategies and created social content for brands such as ASUS, Singapore Tourism Board, Singapore International Foundation, Maggi Mee, Royal Caribbean Cruises, American Tourister, Clarke Quay and Dulux, Intercontinental Hotel, Nikon Essilor Lenswear and many more.
He first joined J. Walter Thompson and Mirum Singapore to launch The Social Team, a social media offering that provides clients access to digital, analytics, content, strategy and creative expertise through one specialised team.
The Social Team was headed by Ng and Kimberley Olsen, associate director, who has also left the agency. Ng, who was appointed head of social, took on a more strategic role, while Olsen focused on business development across the region.
In a statement to Marketing, a JWT spokesperson said, “We thank him for his valuable contribution, having helped build up our agencies’ social competencies, and we wish him the very best for the future.”
Prior to JWT, he was with Vocanic as regional creative director, and also worked at Wunderman as digital art director.
Singtel has launched a new brand spot to showcase its attentiveness towards the customer experience and its customer service. The spot draws parallels to the high service levels provided to royalty in ancient China.
In the video, a princess set in ancient China is seen entering a quarters to seek out the perfect combo or message carrier. The princess rejects every item that is presented to her until late at night, following the salesman’s constant examining and guessing of what her customer needs us. The spot then shifts back to today to reveal that the “princess” is actually a Singtel customer.
The spot is accompanied with a call to action from the brand for customers to share their customer service story. While not all experiences were positive, Singtel kept true to its ad by treating its customers like royalty and responding quickly to both positive and negative comments. That being said, the telco also wittily responded with memes related to the spot itself.
Since its posting on Sunday, the spot has garnered 464,000 views, 2,900 reactions, 438 shares and 210 comments at the time of writing. Watch it here:
Creatives Marketing spoke to also agreed that the spot was well-produced, lauding its focus on customer experience. For Primus Nair, ECD of BBDO Singapore, this is also important for a brand as large as Singtel.
“The production quality is great, so is the idea of a brand focusing on the customer experience as part of their business,” Nair added. Also weighing in was Guan Hin Tay, regional executive creative director of Southeast Asia at J. Walter Thompson, who said that from a creative point of view, the spot also plays off the fact that the customer is king or queen. That being said, this type of advertisement also relies on the customer service received in the stores.
“It means that Singtel will need to bend over backwards to all customer needs, and all it takes is one customer service staff to not follow suit to render this communication not authentic. Indeed, this is a tall order to follow,” Tay said.
Marketing has reached out to Singtel for additional details.
The brand currently works with GOODSTUPH for social and content, BBH as its strategic brand lead and Hogarth as creative production specialist. It also works with OgilvyOne for B2B. This was following a creative and digital pitch last year.
Jeweler Tiffany and Co. paints New York City blue to celebrate the launch of the new Tiffany Paper Flowers™ jewelry collection and the upcoming “Believe In Dreams” campaign.
Tiffany will be filling the streets of New York from May 1 with Tiffany Blue® coffee carts, serving complimentary special brews and croissants. The iconic yellow cabs are transformed to the brand’s trademark robin’s egg blue. BMX bikers and skateboarders will stage freestyle tricks, wearing the same shade as well.
In addition, some subway stations will even receive a Tiffany Blue® treatment and dispense limited-edition Tiffany and Co. MetroCards. Bodegas will have buckets of paper flowers. The famous Atlas clock at the Fifth Avenue flagship store will transform into a digital screen with behind-the-scenes footage and vignettes from the campaign film.
This is to celebrate chief artistic officer Reed Krakoff’s first jewellery collection for Tiffany and Co. The theme revolves around the iconic Breakfast at Tiffany’s scene where Holly Golightly stands in front of a Tiffany window with a coffee and croissant.
In preparation for the launch, Tiffany’s Instagram page vanished on April 28 and posted in black and white on its other social channels. On May 3, Tiffany came to life with bold hues and a full look at the new campaign. The campaign came hot in the heels of the hire of Reed Krakoff. Krakoff is known to have pushed Coach into the limelight in the fashion industry. According to The New York Times, he was hired by the brand last year as chief artistic director “to overhaul the iconic jewellery brand's design, attract younger shoppers and reverse an extended sales slump.”
