Results and Effectiveness

Prior to the campaign, only 35% of potential customers had been ascribing DCoNZ to Dulux. This was only slightly ahead of the ascription to Dulux’s major competitor (33%) After this campaign facilitating customers to be more involved with DCoNZ, the correct ascription to Dulux increased from 35% to 56%. Ascription to their main competitor fell to just 5%. Tens of thousands of visits were recorded to the DCoNZ online gallery and YouTube channel and the facebook activity was seen by over 418,000 people. Dulux customers also requested 537 new colours be added All this from a flat year-on-year budget.

Creative Execution

To gain user engagement, we asked them through paid and social media to send us their photos of their special New Zealand place and mark on a map where it was taken. With only a small incentive, customers sent in a huge amount of photos. In return, we tinted their photos to the matching Dulux colour, then created both TVC’s and online videos of the result. Not just one or two, but 50 DIFFERENT TVC’s and HUNDREDS of online video ads. They were flighted with a strategy of maximising the number of people seeing 5 or more different executions. A gallery in facebook housed the images and drove ownership and sharing with friends. Search drove website visits and advertisements in Home magazines became detailed reference points for influencers and active decorators. Finally, point of sale material connected the campaign at the vital last metres of the paint aisle.

Insights, Strategy and the Idea

In a country closely connected to nature, colours evoke powerful responses in the hearts of New Zealanders. So 10 years ago, leading paint brand, Dulux capitalised on this by creating a range of 600 colours called Dulux Colours of New Zealand (DCoNZ) inspired by and named after New Zealand places. People could use the colours of New Zealand’s wonderful natural environment to turn a house into a home. But we had two problems; previous campaigns hadn’t demonstrated the extent of the DCoNZ range and people also didn’t strongly associate DCoNZ with Dulux. Our strategy was to hand DCoNZ over to New Zealanders. To ask them “What’s your colour?” To get them to remember special times and places and to take ownership of ‘their colours’ among the DCoNZ range Featuring just 1 or 2 colours out of 600 in a ‘One size fits all’ advertisement therefore wouldn’t be sufficient