Creative Execution

On 22nd August 2014, Malaysia’s National Day of Mourning, we launched a mobile website to provide the digital world a way to honour the victims. When users visited the mobile website they were asked to enable ‘Airplane Mode’ on their mobile devices. After the website detects that the user is disconnected, a one-minute countdown starts. We used our owned media and the owned channels of our clients to seed the website. To earn media we contacted influential blogs and news websites to feature the website. We also included a social toolkit, which participants can download to promote the website.

On Malaysia’s National Day of Mourning, thousands visited the website and disconnected for a minute. Thousands more downloaded our Social Toolkit and shared the site on their social media pages. International companies including L’Oréal, Mitsubishi, Mondelēz, OCBC, Zurich Insurance responded and promoted ‘Minute of Silence’ on their social media pages and websites. Influential blogs featured the website, driving further awareness and participation. In November 2014, when the Netherlands held its National Day of Mourning for those who perished in the MH17 flight, Dutch news networks invited their citizens to visit the site to pay their respects. Up to June 2015, more than 60,000 individuals from 80 countries have accepted the invitation and ‘disconnected’.

2014 has been a year of unparalleled tragedy for Malaysia and its people. The recent aviation disasters coming so close together have been deeply felt throughout the nation. The Malaysian government officially declared a National Day of Mourning to be held on 22nd August 2014. A nationwide ‘Minute of Silence’ was to be observed across the country. But while the ‘physical’ world would respectfully fly flags at half-mast, the inescapable truth was that many Malaysians would continue to spend their time online. Tweeting, texting and posting continues. Mutiara – a company which works closely with Malaysian government organisations and Malaysian companies – wished to create a platform that would allow Malaysians to come together for a minute of respectful silence. Our strategy was to engage directly online and through their mobile devices. To demonstrate their solidarity and actively participate in the national mourning, we invited them to ‘disconnect to connect’.