How CHiPs and ANZ are Stopping Scammers in the Tracks with TBWA\NZ
Scammers are everywhere. They are on our emails, in our text messages and they even ring our phones. It’s hard to avoid scammers in the digital age, and even harder to navigate when one is not experienced in the ways of scammers.
In order to combat this issue of bank details getting stolen, emails hacked and the fear of personal details being used for fraud, ANZ and TBWA\New Zealand called upon the only people right for the job… Officer Frank “Ponch” Poncherello and Officer Jon Baker from the California Highway Patrol, also known as ‘CHiPs.’
The 1977 TV drama, CHiPs was and still is a beloved series within the shores of New Zealand. Its title as a fan favourite has made it easily recognised and extremely nostalgic for those in the demographic most targeted by scammers.
TBWA\New Zealand licensed scenes from the TV show in order to raise awareness and educate viewers on the essential behaviours needed to protect against the most common scams.
LBB’s Casey Martin spoke to TBWA\New Zealand’s Shane Bradnick, Ashley Wilding and Daniel Davison about the logistics of licensing TV shows and getting the Erik Estrada tick of approval from a close family member.
LBB> What was the intention of the brief?
Shane> Age Concern is the leading charity dedicated to promoting the care, wellbeing and security of older people. Our Client ANZ had been a big supporter of theirs and they came to us looking for how we could help raise awareness around scams and help educate older New Zealanders about this growing threat. Many scam safety initiatives effectively highlight the problem, but fall short in teaching people how to avoid scams in the first place. Our brief identified 80% of elderly people are too polite and trusting of people they don’t know. So to make them safer, we had to help them become more suspicious and confident enough to slam the phone down on a stranger. The brief was also really clear, dont scare, talk down to this audience - engage, empower and entertain.
LBB> How did the idea of using the original CHiPs come about to target a particular audience?
Ash & Dan> Like anybody else we initially thought, “Let’s use influencers to influence behaviour”. But this needed to look a little different for this audience, so we decided to bring back some widely known and influential characters from the past.
We made a list of TV cops, but some were too obscure and others were unavailable. CHiPs was always in our top three for many reasons. Everyone knows it, the 'patrol' theme is a perfect CTA, and Ash's mum still has a crush on Erik Estrada.
LBB> Was it always the intention to use a popular TV show to get your message across?
Ash & Dan> Yeah, we knew that when it comes to personifying the sceptical nature we wanted our audience to adopt, nobody does it quite like old-school TV cops. Then there’s the catchy music, the grainy footage, the cheesy actors—it’s pure nostalgia. We wanted to use that to our advantage.
One thing we quickly realised in production was tweaking a few words to turn an old storyline into a new one about scams worked better than rewriting big chunks of scenes. Major changes felt fake, and we wanted people to feel like they were watching the original show.
LBB> When it comes to targeting a particular bracket, what is the most important thing to know about your audience in order to successfully promote something to them?
Shane> We worked very closely with Age Concern and the people they support to understand what they needed to hear about, where their barriers were and how they wanted to be communicated with. In a behavioural change and awareness brief, you have to know how your audience wants to be engaged with and you need to know where they are: our audience watch daytime TV, read newspapers and listen to the radio.
LBB> When it came to pulling all of the assets together for this campaign, what were the highlights and what were the challenges?
Shane> CHiPS is an iconic TV show, so being able to create a campaign from something that is a historic part of culture is definitely a highlight, as was having Eric ‘Ponch’ Estrada being part of it and supporting it.
Sitting through six seasons of CHiPs to find the perfect moments was super fun - discovering so many gem lines and seeing the edits come to life was awesome - it was definitely a big production job, requiring clever editing and the licencing of the show, footage, actors, music and securing permission from the California Highway Patrol, even using some smart AI voice tools to get 80s action stars say modern things.
This project would never have made it off the paper it was first presented on If it weren’t for the patience and perseverance of everyone involved. A full team effort, this campaign is changing the way older people are tackling scammers, delivering an awareness campaign like no other for Age Concern and helping ANZ support a critical issue in banking right now: educating customers on how to battle scammers.
LBB> Why is this campaign important to you?
Shane> Scammers are targeting New Zealanders, and older Kiwis in particular. They prey on their friendly, polite good nature and it's just not fair. But at the same time too often campaigns around scams and fraud to older audiences are patronising or overly complicated and boring. We wanted to deliver an important message in an engaging and empowering way, work that would resonate with our older audience and treat them with respect, and would entertain them at the same time as give them the simple advice to avoid being scammed.
LBB> When working on a campaign that is more than just transition advertising, how do you go about ensuring that the message and purpose can be wide spread across TVC to posters to interactive elements like the crossword puzzles and stickers?
Shane> The show and the characters was a fun way and entertaining way to land a very simple and important message across every touchpoint - to be on patrol for scams and frauds, and you ‘have the right’ to be suspicious of unexpected calls, text and emails, to be cautious when investments sound to good to be true and to hang up when any caller that asks urgently to transfer money. The CHIP’s characters made it really easy to take these messages, lessons and reminders everywhere.
