Creative Execution

Without going too far with the staging or expressions, we produced a simulation movie about texting while walking using crowd simulation software to demonstrate the danger of this behavior. Within three days after the movie went up on YouTube, it surpassed 1.2 million views. It has now been watched over 2.3 million times, totally unheard of for an educational advertisement. There are also a number of parody movies made by users, and importantly for a good manners advertisement, has elicited spontaneous actions by users that demonstrate “awareness,” “realization,” and “conversation.”

By taking a simulation approach, the project went beyond the role of an advertisement, and was taken up as an “educational material” by numerous TV programs, newspapers, magazines and Web media. TV : 19 programs paper-based media : 38 publications Web-based media : 575 sites Advertising conversion : 13 million dollars worth of coverage Texting while walking-related tweets : 100 times compared to previous year

As smartphones increase in popularity, texting while walking-related accidents are increasing. Many people are aware of the dangers of this behavior, yet they realize that “I’m doing it too!” That’s why we wanted to go beyond the typical “informational” type of good manner advertising so that smartphone users would keenly feel something about this issue. We therefore produced the world’s first educational advertisement that used simulations to improve manners.