Background:
The Catalogue, IKEA’s main marketing tool for decades was in its 67th year of publication. The brief, like every year, was to get people excited about the 2018 IKEA Catalogue. Except for a few new products and a couple of designer collaborations, there wasn’t much that was new about the 2018 IKEA catalogue. Just telling people that there was a new IKEA catalogue wasn’t going to be enough. We had to find fresh new ways to make noise about a silent little direct mailer that arrives in your mailbox.
 
 
 
Idea: 
We got a human to memorise the entire IKEA Catalogue. And made her the PR vehicle to make the catalogue famous again. We tested her in front of IKEA experts, sent her to press events, and tested her LIVE on Facebook in front of thousands of viewers. From reporters to consumers, to even Steve Harvey, everyone who heard about the story was curious to meet her, test her, pick up the catalogue and try memorising pages themselves.
Her incredible story helped us reach an audience way beyond our media-buying capacity.
People were watching branded content about Yanjaa online, or seeing her on News. At the same time, they were studying the catalogue offline, decoding how she memorised everything. Even when they were watching her being tested, they were paying attention to the IKEA products more than ever. Making the experience more enriching and experiential.
 
 
 
Strategy:
In a world where technology is impacting every industry exponentially, making many traditional mediums irrelevant we had to make the catalogue, one of the oldest forms of direct mail relevant in today's time. The approach throughout was to create an incredible human story that goes beyond advertising and becomes a part of pop culture.
People are more likely to share human stories over maybe, a 60-second ad. We knew if we could make the story famous, we would in effect make the catalogue famous.
 
Did this girl really memorise all those pages? This kept everyone guessing. And that in turn, made the whole world take notice and test her for themselves.
We built out a story via multiple assets that would allow others to share, edit and redistribute it. We also made the campaign interactive by nature, with a Facebook live event at its heart.
 
 
 
 
Execution:
It all started with an experiment: to challenge someone to memorise the entire 2018 IKEA catalogue. 4818 products. 328 pages. One incredible story.
She became the living, breathing catalogue for all practical purpose.
She was in our advertising and branded content. She was at all the Catalogue press launches in South-east Asia. Through earned media she became the face of the IKEA catalogue on TV, radio, newspapers, and social media.
 
Was that even humanly possible? The answer to that question became the premise of our launch film. Where Yanjaa was tested in front of IKEA experts. From reporters to influencers to consumers, everyone who heard about the story was curious to know more.  To meet her, test her, pick up the catalogue and try it for themselves. On 6th Sep 2017, the IKEA Human Catalogue went on Facebook LIVE and was tested by a LIVE audience in front of thousands.
 
 

Results:
Social conversation and shares were generated in 71 countries. The story reached 124 countries in total from coverage in over 100 different media brands across all media types, most notably peak Television editorial. Aggregated views of the films in owned media exceeded 17,000,000.An independent analysis aggregates the reach of all of this activity to be in excess of 73,000,000 people.
 
Business Metrics:
Using programmatic tagging we identified that 54% of those exposed to Yanjaa’s film assets visited the site to learn more about the catalogue after viewing without clicking on a banner or link! In total 65% of total web traffic across the period was attributable to the campaign.
In total the campaign generated an ROI of 1:18 in SGD.
More importantly, it made a lot of people in the world pick up the catalogue and read it. Making an icon relevant in 2018 again.