SPOOKTACULAR

TitleSPOOKTACULAR
BrandSENTOSA
Product / ServiceSIGNATURE HALLOWEEN EVENT
CategoryA09. Best use or integration of digital or social media
EntrantMANDATE ADVERTISING Singapore, SINGAPORE
Entrant Company MANDATE ADVERTISING Singapore, SINGAPORE
Contributing Company MANDATE ADVERTISING Singapore, SINGAPORE
Contributing Company 2 EMAGINATION Singapore, SINGAPORE
Production Company SALT FILMS Singapore, SINGAPORE

Credits

Name Company Position
Jimmy Teo Mandate Advertising Intl. Brand Communications Director
Jake Tan Emagination Digital Designer
Nino Jonson Emagination Digital Art Director
Xie Guanghong Emagination Lead Digital Developer
Paul Koh Emagination Principal Consultant
Bernard Delumin Mandate Advertising Intl. Art Director
Jude Castillo Mandate Advertising Intl. Associate Creative Director
Tytan Chang Mandate Advertising Intl. Copywriter
James Dickinson Mandate Advertising Intl. Associate Creative Director
Desmond Kuah Mandate Advertising Intl. Creative Director

The Campaign

Despite branded content being around for some time, it is still a relatively new concept for the Singapore market. Whilst clients here have heard of it, they are unsure of its usefulness for marketing purposes. Ultimately, their concern is about how branded content can help them reach their brand goals or drive their bottom line. When we first worked on Sentosa Island’s Signature Halloween event – Spooktacular – in 2010, it was all about creating an immersive, digital driven campaign that could connect with our young audience. We did this through creating very successful single and multi-player gaming portals that were integrated with social media. However, with the introduction of new and bigger budget Halloween events to the market, we had to push the envelope in 2012 and find an innovative way to for Spooktacular to stand out and connect with a young target audience – and we did it through innovative branded content.

Results

The challenge was to create branded content that would connect with and inspire the youth to share. We wanted the content to be original, innovative and offer a true-to-brand experience. So we literally brought it to life by combining viral video, website, social media and mobile technology to create a new and never seen before branded content. Leveraging on legends of paranormal activity on Sentosa dating back to World War 2 - we created a short branded viral video and then seeded on YouTube. The video followed the ill-fated adventure of a group of Singaporean teens who broke into the tunnels of Fort Siloso at night. Eerie goings on, strange sounds and scary events ensue. Our video culminates with a Singaporean teen stranded in the tunnel, desperately dialling his hand phone for help. As it is dialling, he is caught by an unseen ghoul and dragged off down the tunnel to meet his doom – leaving the mobile ringing on the floor. A ghoulish hand is then seen picking up the victim’s fallen phone. And at this moment, the viewer watching the video sees his REAL phone number appear on the screen written in blood!! The viewer is then urged to pick up! Suddenly the viewer’s REAL PHONE ACTUALLY RINGS – when picked up, the viewer is confronted with an eerie voice daring him to ‘Come Play’ at Spooktacular – If They Dare! In short – we made branded content contagious by sending it viral! Key Objectives • A unique branded content that could offer a true-to-brand experience • Integrate the campaign across multiple touch-points: social media, web, YouTube and mobile. • Increase event awareness via social media channels and event website visitorship • Increase the number of NEW visitors (visitors who have not attended past Spooktacular events)

• We created a scary branded video set in Sentosa and then seeded it online. Viewers are encouraged to prank their friends using video on Facebook • The pranksters post a link to our video on their friends’ walls • Friends pick up the link and are directed to an unbranded website to the watch video • Friends watch the video, but the ending changes. Using Facebook info, the viewer’s REAL phone number appears in blood, and REAL phone RINGS – we deliver our frightfully real branded message • We reveal Spooktacular and invite the prankees to become pranksters

We are happy to report our campaign met and greatly surpassed expectations in terms of our key objectives. KEY STATS* KPI exceeded for event awareness via social media channels • Jump from 38.6% (2011) to 45.7% (2012) including… • 75,000 YouTube Viral Video Views • Over 25,000 Facebook Impressions • Over 1,000 picked-up prank calls • All the above achieved over a 6-week campaign period KPI exceeded for event website visitorship • 60.9% of attendees visited the website (up from 54.3% in 2011) during the 6-week period KPI exceeded for increase in NEW visitors to Spooktacular event • 87.4% of the attendees had not visited past Spooktacular events *Source of Results Sentosa Spooktacular Research Study 2012 performed by Sentosa Leisure Management