Why is this work relevant for Brand Experience & Activation?

In support of the release of Netflix India's Bard of Blood, a series which sees a professor of Shakespearean literature reluctantly takes up his role of intelligence officer again, Tommy worked closely with the Netflix India team to concept and deliver an on-ground activation in one of the four key cities in India. The centrepiece of the campaign was the creation of a unique innovative OOH experience in Ambience Vasant Kunj Mall in Delhi where we gave fans a chance to live out their dreams as secret agents, alongside the Bard of Blood himself – Emraan Hashmi!

Background

Netflix saw an opportunity in capturing the greater audience by wooing them with elevating the most popular genre: action-thriller fiction (specifically spy-thriller) in the Indian market, with the all-new Bard of Blood series. The creative ask lies in the 'How' - how do we create awareness and buzz around this new series in the way that our Millennial target audience attunes to? The solution - curating a hyper-personalised experience which allowed mass-viewing in real-time. Perfect for an audience who doesn't just love to be seen, but more importantly to be seen as someone unique. The objective of this on-ground experience is to pique interest of the potential viewers of the series and drive Netflix subscription growth in market.

Describe the creative idea (20% of vote)

Our main objective was to increase title awareness of Bard of Blood with Indian audiences. With that in mind, we wanted our on-ground digital activation idea to stay close to the storyline, where we emulated the thrill of letting the audience go through the induction process as a secret agent. Each undercover agent enters an interactive photobooth, securing their agent status with their secret agent ID Pass – complete with their agent pseudonym. To welcome the new recruits, the ID Pass will be displayed real-time onto digital out-of-home screens (above the event space, LED Panels within and outside of the mall). The digital outputs are also given to the participants to facilitate sharing on their individual social accounts.

Describe the strategy (20% of vote)

The core audience are individuals who have a high affinity index towards titles like Bard of Blood. They are Millennial males, aged from 25-40 who are fans of three main interest groups: Fans of the Spy Thriller-Action genre, the Bard of Blood book and the main lead Emraan Hashmi. The key markets identified within India are Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore and Pune. We want to immerse this crowd by letting them be part of the storyline, done so through painting the narrative that secret agents have only existed in the covert world of espionage and hence the importance of protecting one's identity. Thus, the creative approach focused on carving an undercover agent identity by first creating unique agent pseudonyms. Each participant will be randomly assigned an agent name from a selection of 20 names, derived from famous Shakespearean characters, which will then appear on their personalised ID Passes.

Describe the execution (30% of vote)

We worked with a tight timeline of having only 6 weeks for production, post project kick-off. The team delivered a multitude of assets, purposed for Digital OOH, on-ground activation assets (i.e. merchandise, panels, floor vinyls, ushers' T-shirts, lanyards, and queueing barriers). We set up a three-storey, 70 screen, interactive installation within the Ambience Vasant Kunj Mall in Delhi. 1. Digital OOH We delivered a total of 60 deliverables. We have assets created for the various parts of exteriors of the mall, across corporate parks and buildings within the shopping compound. 2. On-ground Activation Assets We delivered a total of 14 deliverables.

List the results (30% of vote)

This recruitment exercise saw an addition of 1,300 secret agents over just a span of 4 days on launch weekend. On average, this activation garnered 500,000 impressions per day, which drove traffic not only to the on-ground activation itself in Ambience Vasant Kunj Mall in Delhi , but also driving traffic to Netflix's platform. Positive brand sentiments for the series have been captured on social sites and people were excited to watch Netflix's latest tentpole series.