The Campaign

Studies show that with constant practice, people can overcome their fears permanently. So we collaborated with doctors and VR programmers to create a free home training VR app to help people overcome two of the most common fears using Samsung Gear VR and Samsung Galaxy mobile. The Fear of Public Speaking VR app was designed with computer graphics, while the locations for the Fear of Heights VR app were filmed with 360 cameras. How it works is simple. Each app contains various scenarios and levels that were carefully selected by the medical staff. People are exposed to fears in stages to gradually overcome their fears. It’s the world’s first VR app that holistically utilizes your heart rate, eye contact and voce recognition to give a personalized feedback. Although VR is a one to one experience, the campaign is designed so people can get support and encouragement from social media.

Creative Execution

To strongly engage 18-29 young consumers with Samsung, we asked about their biggest fear that stops them in life through YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and other social media. And backed up by recent medical journals, the common fears addressed were the fear of heights and fear of public speaking. 1 in 5 people have a fear of public speaking (Ruscio et al., 2008) 1 in 4 people have a fear of heights (Brandt & Huppert, 2014) Doctors in VR clinics and VR professionals were gathered together to create VR training apps for each fear. Theses were created to have the highest quality Samsung Galaxy S6 specification allows and was completed in 10 months. And at last, the VR apps were translated into 4 different languages: Korean, English, German, Russian.

Doctors from Yonsei University Gangnam Severance Hospital approved the credibility of the BeFearless VR app through their own clinical testing. After only two weeks of VR training, 87.8% of 82 people saw benefits. People with fear of public speaking were able to reduce their anxiety score by 18.7% and those with fear of heights by 23.6%. Following its succes, the campaign was covered in more than 350 media including public TV and major newspapers worldwide which values more than 1 million dollars. The journeys of our participants had over 100 million views and over 400 million media impression worldwide. Samsung #BeFearless VR apps had more than 50, 000 downloads on Oculus Store with a high rating of 4. #BeFearless program is now also being used in the hospital’s VR clinic. After the campaign, Samsung’s brand attachment and advocacy improved as high as 18.9%.

Among thousands of entertainment oriented VR contents out there, Samsung adds a life changing element onto it. #BeFearless merges medical technology with VR technology by creating the world’s first systematic VR app to utilize heart rate, eye contact, and voice recognition. It is a home training VR app to help people overcome their fear of public speaking and fear of heights easily at home using Samsung Gear VR and Samsung Galaxy mobile. The VR apps can be downloaded for free and is also currently being used in hospital’s VR clinic.