The Campaign

The Association of Accredited Advertising Agents Singapore (4As) has seen declining interest in the Crowbars from schools, students and agencies. Entries dipped in 2007 and the overall feeling is that the show needs a boost to remain relevant in the industry. Within the advertising community, there was also a nagging perception that a student competition is not quite as important as other big name award shows with student categories. The objective is to produce an integrated call-for-entry campaign by challenging students to create and submit their very best work and make the Crowbars the talk of the town again.

Success of the Campaign

While 4As is a not-for-profit organisation, the results of the campaign have been extraordinary in terms of growth figures. The number of participating schools shot up by 36% -- including ten new schools -- to reach the highest-ever in Crowbar history. Over 1,000 entries were submitted and the high quality and quantity of the entries led to a whopping 52% increase in the number of awards handed out -- yielding the strongest crop of students the competition has ever produced. (Source: 4As, Sarah Tang - Marketing Communications Manager)

Describe how the campaign/entry was launched and executed across each channel in the order of implementation.

To front the Crowbar Awards call-for-entries, we found the perfect epitome of youth, talent and ambition - Billy Lee, the world's first advertising child prodigy. We seeded a mini-documentary about this precocious boy genius on the web. The 4As then followed up with an official release, declaring this year’s Crowbars a foregone conclusion. Visitors to the official website were redirected to Billy’s homepage, where the charmingly conceited genius would infuriate students with insults. Students can join a fan-club of top creative directors, bribe him from entering with gifts and even buy his rejected ideas on eBay. This campaign completely overturned the old call for entries model.