The Campaign

Widespread smartphone usage in Korea has led to increased media usage through mobile platforms such as VOD and digital clips, and a corresponding drop in TV viewership. This trend is most visible among our campaign’s target group of teens and twentysomethings. According to a 2014 survey, 94.4% of teens and 97.2% of twentysomethings owned smartphones and a high proportion preferred to watch broadcasts on smart devices rather than the TV. 40% of teens and twentysomethings said that their TV watching time had fallen compared to 1 year before. Advertising in Korea is also undergoing sweeping change, with consumers proactively looking for information via online reviews and price comparison sites. Thus word-of-mouth marketing, social campaigns and online viral marketing have become important tools of marketing. While demand for TV advertisements has fallen, the role of innovative and attractive branded entertainment which connects with existing cultural contents such as broadcast programs, movies and music has become more important.

Results

Our goal was to raise the profile of hiphop by generating public interest in <SMTM3>, thereby providing young rappers the chance to shine and ultimately establishing adidas Originals as an iconic brand that empowers creativity among youths and creates new culture. We analyzed the digital habits of our target age group (13-29), and designed the campaign to go viral organically, by creating contents on both the TV show and SNS. First, we put a hashtag in the title of our campaign so that it could be easily recognized and distributed on digital platforms. Then we created a campaign beat, which acted to unify our all branded contents. For the medium of TV, we created a sponsor ID with famous Korean hiphop stars SanE and Swings rapping over the promotional beat with lyrics emphasizing their originality. Also an episode featured the contestants writing their own rap to the campaign beat for a rap battle. The program was sprinkled with scenes emphasizing originality and Adidas Originals products were given exposure as a fashion brand loved by hiphop stars. On digital platforms, the <SMTM3> promo site, the official Youtube channel of m.net, and the Facebook page of m.net were used to distribute contents in the form of digital clips right after the program aired. The digital clips spread organically on popular SNS. On social platforms, we held a rap contest where contestants could enter just by downloading the free campaign beat and uploading a video of themselves rapping to it on SNS with the #allinforbeat hashtag. About 300 entries were uploaded in 3 weeks. We created a music video by combining their videos. It was posted on SNS, with selected winners being awarded products from our brand.

We added a hashtag to the campaign title, to draw the attention of youths who are active users of SNS, and allowing them to easily access our campaign on their preferred SNS, inducing its organic diffusion. The hashtag was especially effective during the rap contest, as users could participate just by taking a video of themselves rapping and uploading it to their preferred SNS with the #allinforbeat hashtag. This drew many participants in a short period of time.

Digital clips viewed passed 51 million in three months. SNS rap contest received 300 entries in 3weeks. Related keywords became hot search terms on major Korean portals for every episode. 7 songs released during the program by <SMTM3> contestants topped music charts. Talented young rappers who lacked the opportunity to showcase their talents and youths displayed their originality in the #allinforbeat contest. Buzz volume for 'Adidas Originals' went up 72% on Korean SNS and sales went up 40%. adidas Originals established itself as an iconic brand that empowers the creativity of Korean youths and creates new culture.

<Show Me the Money(SMTM)> is a talent audition program for rappers on the Korean music channel m.net. One winner is picked through survival rounds of rap battle. #allinforbeat was an integrated media campaign jointly conducted by adidas Originals and <SMTM season3> What set this campaign apart from others? Firstly, the hiphop concept of the program was combined with the brand slogan, 'all in for' to create the campaign title of 'all-in-for-beat' which contains the meaning ‘let out your originality over the beat’, which perfectly expresses the message of adidas Originals- "Empower creative courage & originality" Secondly, the TV program dealt with common concerns of youths living in this day and age- the judgement of others, reality vs. dreams, and the struggle to find one’s originality, drawing empathy from the audience. Based on this empathy, social events and viral campaigns were carried out to effectively deliver our message.