Background

During the Covid-19 lockdown in Malaysia, KFC had to shut down their dine-in service. Although they were still open for delivery, dine-in was their main source of revenue. So, after 3 long months, the announcement of their stores reopening for dine-in was crucial.

Describe the strategy

To announce the reopening of KFC's dine-in service, we needed to reach out to customers of all ages, and of all races. So, we used the universal language of music. Instead of doing the usual announcement, KFC serenaded people back into their stores through a trilingual playlist of sentimental songs and a film featuring a lonely KFC restaurant.

Describe the execution

A specially-curated trilingual Spotify playlist titled “KFC You Soon” was created. We included sentimental songs like Officially Missing You, Baby Come Back, When Can I See You Again and Wish You Were Here to tell people just how much we’ve missed them. The playlist featured 86 songs to commemorate the 86 days that the dine-in service was unavailable. To drive the playlist, we launched a dedication video on YouTube, Facebook and Instagram that featured a lonely KFC store, and let the furniture do the talking – literally. They expressed how they’ve longed for the return of customers through lyrics from songs in our playlist.

List the results

KFC made their “open for dine-in” announcement music to people’s ears. The campaign garnered over 6 million impressions, 9.9% increase in brand consideration and 22.3% increase in purchase intention. More importantly, the KFC stores are no longer a quiet place.

Please tell us how disruption in your market place inspired the work

During the Covid-19 lockdown in Malaysia, KFC had to close their stores. Although they were still open for delivery, dine-in was their main source of revenue. After 3 months, the announcement of the stores reopening needed to cut through the clutter and drive consumers back into their stores. We wanted to get people to miss dining in-store at KFC as much as KFC has missed them.