Background

The credit card category in Singapore is fiercely contested and has been reduced to a game of numbers – incentives and cash rebates – to drive acquisition. Local and international banks offer undifferentiated benefits, and to the category leaders (DBS/POSB, OCBC, UOB) go the spoils of generic communication efforts. HSBC, a challenger brand, was not top-of-mind for Singaporean consumers shopping for cards. The card leading the charge, HSBC’s Visa Platinum Credit (VPC) card offered only up to 5% cash rebates, facing stiff competition from banks with more lucrative rewards. To gain ground, we needed to elevate the conversation. The campaign objectives were Acquisition: Increase VPC card sign-ups by 25% vs. the same period in 2017, Market penetration: Grow from a plateau of 12-13%, Build brand salience, affinity and preference amongst the target audience measured by a Customer Recommendation Index ranking uplift: Move up from rank 4 into the Top 3.

Describe the creative idea

We relaunched VPC as a family card by translating generic rebates to something more valuable – quality family time. The target audience – Singaporean parents (35-45 years old) with young kids – struggle to balance family life and work. Often, family time gets sacrificed and is burdened with regret. The creative idea – HSBC Family Time – brought this emotion to the fore and helped the audience identify the problem to solve. Most importantly, we paid off this emotion by reframing the VPC card offering with unique rewards centred around their families, against category convention of generic, replicable rebates, thereby changing the conversation. For instance, the offers were reframed as follows: A 5% rebate on fuel meant more family road trips and adventures. A 5% rebate on dining and grocery meant more family dinners. Free entry to bird park/zoos for kids for kids meant sharing new experiences together.

Describe the strategy

92% of our target audience cite family as their topmost priority, yet in day-to-day life, family time is readily sacrificed. Most blame long working hours. Even when family members are physically together, they’re plugged into multiple screens, not spending quality time together. Concurrently, they look for value on their family’s everyday spend – grocery, fuel, dining, and saving for vacations. To emotionalise the card’s benefits, we needed to find the right voice and medium. We tapped on the smallest yet mightiest influencers – kids and devised a two-pronged strategy to elevate this message: 1) Build brand affinity and the need for family time through emotive content – amplifying a social experiment film across impactful touchpoints online and offline to spark heartfelt discussion and reflection. 2) Drive conversions by intercepting parents in family moments with functional messages – conversion by showcasing the card’s benefits at opportune moments through highly targeted media.

Describe the execution

The contrasting and unscripted responses from the social experiment film tugged at heartstrings, reminding parents to spend more quality family time together and how the VPC card enabled it. The strategy was brought to life with an integrated media approach: 1) Perfectly timed to coincide with school holidays, we sparked reflection by seeding the film on social and programmatic video and then amplified awareness through impactful touchpoints like cinema pre-rolls, press, taxis and OOH in shopping districts and “baby towns”. Further engagement and conversation were then driven through collaborations with influencers like TheChillMom and Cheekiemonkies. 2) Through an action-driven strategy, we drove conversion by intercepting parents on highly-targeted channels like programmatic, search and social with dynamic creative to showcase relevant messages based on interests. To reach our audience, we used custom audience and location targeting and were present at family-oriented events like the Pinkfong musical and Singapore Zoo.

List the results

The VPC card relaunch campaign was a ground-breaker for HSBC, proving that our insights-led, integrated strategy was the right approach. It generated affinity: - 1,174,046 views of the social experiment film - 6.5x website landings vs. previous quarter, exceeding our KPI by +242% - +20% positive social conversations during launch, compared to 75 days pre-launch - Total earned media >S$50,000 from consumers, experts and publishers And for the first time, HSBC, a challenger brand scored #1 on CRI (Customer Recommendation Index), a rigorous indicator of brand affinity and loyalty. We drove conversions, surpassing ambitious business targets: - +45% YoY increase in VPC card sign-ups, exceeding our KPI by 80% - 15% market penetration, not only surpassed KPIs but was also the highest in three years But most important of all was the happy smiles on the faces of families that got to truly enjoy quality time together with HSBC VPC.