The Brief

Men aged 30s-40s use mobile-phones for calls, not data. We aimed to get them to use phones for content. We targeted otaku, nerds. Otaku not only matched the demographic, but also their zeal for things.. Our insight centered on their extreme competitiveness. We created a competition to stoke their competitive fire and force them to use their mobile-phones to access the client’s content to compete.

Creative Execution

Japanese “otaku” or nerds spare no effort or expense in pursuit of their passion. Their strongest desire is to be No.1 and showing off their exotic knowledge is their greatest pleasure. Put another way, otaku want nothing more than to win. Leveraging this insight, we created an online space where railroad otaku would gather and compete in a quiz to decide the Otaku King of the Railroad.

Describe the creative solution to the brief/objective.

We announced the competition on posters, in train stations where only true railroad otaku would notice. Some of the stations were extremely remote. A competition began to see who could locate a new poster first. Word spread via otakus’ blogs. As for the mobile-phone content, we created a difficult 1,000-question quiz, which would challenge participants’ knowledge and endurance over a month. To further stoke their competitive fire, we displayed their real-time rankings on the site.

Results

Railroad otaku, 30-40 year old men who had never used mobile phone content, began to use their phones to access content for the contest. The challenge led them from zero to hours of usage. As they boasted of their latest ranking via blog, word of the competition went mainstream and got picked up by news. With over 70,000 participants, The Otaku King of the Railroad Competition brought to life the largest railroad community in Japan.