Results and Effectiveness

The campaign created a substantial buzz amongst young women which drove them to be a part of the smile collection contest at cinema lobbies. We got 800 smiles in cinema lobbies itself. The campaign helped Listerine to achieve 95% of full year target within 3 months. The variant became 2nd largest in the portfolio. As a result, Listerine portfolio grew 35% after the launch of Bright & Clean with no cannibalization into to base business. The campaign dazzled in the Malaysian Media Awards 2009 with 2 Silvers and received the J&J APAC marketing award.

Creative Execution

We decide to talk to them at different points in the day when their need for brighter teeth was strongest. We talked via touch points that drove talkability among friends, making Listerine the talk of the town. They rode monorails where window stickers suggested different smiles for typical monorail interactions. They pick up copies of The Sun where masthead said ‘Outshine the Sun with Listerine Bright & Clean’. For magazines, the page opposite to ads had editorial photos of people taking cover from the dazzling teeth on the opposite page! At Cinema lobbies, shinny smiles photos were put up on a wall. In cinema halls, we ran custom capsule:The cinema went dark & a mouth-shaped spotlight appeared on the screen. The camera then panned to a girl in the audience, who smiled with dazzling teeth.The mouth-shape spotlight is actually its reflection. Boyfriend elbowed her to shut her mouth and the show begins.

Insights, Strategy and the Idea

Listerine launched a new variant – Bright & Clean and wanted to communicate ‘Shine with Brighter Cleaner Teeth’. The objective was to generate a buzz leveraging on the cosmetic benefit of teeth whitening leading to high trials & frequency. Toothpastes always had a monopoly in the share of mouth of teeth whitening and for a mouthwash to gain traction in such a cluttered environment, Listerine had to distinctly stand out and engage the young females who were the key target in an appealing way. We found that mouthwash is not perceived to be ‘cool’ and ‘in’ thing for our target group and the connotation with bad breath reigned supreme. To break this image while promote a mouthwash with a whitening benefit ( a mainstay of toothpastes) and to shatter the clutter we figured that the best way is to leverage exaggeration and humour to make our point via the social & lifestyle touchpoints.