How Grey Singapore Turned Every Letter ‘e’ Into a Retail Site for giga
For the launch of its new 5G eSIM, mobile service provider giga released ‘giga E-xplorer’, an AR filter that turns every letter ‘e’ into a retail site. Created by Grey Singapore, the filter is accessible to anyone via giga’s website and social channels.
Using your smartphone camera to recognise any ‘e’ in your environment, the filter unlocks a range of fun prizes and promo codes for giga’s new 5G eSIM plans.
Here, Grey Malaysia and Singapore CCO, Graham Drew, joins LBB’s Sunna Coleman to reveal how the team accomplished this feat.
LBB> What was the initial brief from the client, what were their goals, and what were your early ideas?
Graham> It was a brief for a 5G eSIM from giga – a wonderful client we've had for about a year and a half. Considering all the 5G noise that's been made by all the other telcos over the last few years, it felt wise to focus on the eSIM part of it. But neither were new things to the category, so we had to find a fun and disruptive way in.
We had fun! The thought was, what if there is no sim? What could you do with the old sim? A guitar pick maybe, a house for insects, dental veneers for horses and even slippers for hamsters.
There was also the green aspect of no sim. Go eSIM, and by not having a physical sim, you save the planet – somewhat overplaying the role of a tiny card. Common sense prevailed; we kept thinking. Games. Everyone likes games. Instead of just incentivising people to 'join' – what if we made a game out of it?
But we wanted everyone to win, so what if we made the easiest treasure hunt in the world? At one point, we thought of using every five in Singapore. It was on the banknotes. Well, the $5 and the $50, but then realised there was an ‘e’ in Singapore – and that's on every note! There’s more mileage in an ‘e’; it's the most used letter in the English language. It's ‘EvErywhErE’.
LBB> The tech and logistics behind this campaign seem very intricate. How did you land on the final concept?
Graham> I think it all came together because we have a lean team, and everyone gets on with it. We have a great tech guy so it all just fell into place. And if the tech guy is great conceptually, you hardly need to pitch up at the office.
The tech, in truth, was kind of straightforward. We had our partners in Singapore, called Genesis, who helped us put it together. Amazing team! They would do a rendition, we would get everyone in the office to test it out, all faults fed back, and there would be a few rounds of this, and all was good.
The masters of the operation are Fangyi Tan [senior brand manager] and Andrea Toh [senior brand executive] who keep it all together, cope with ever-changing realities and make things happen. Peter is a pun master general and has a wonderfully playful copy style that was perfect for the tone of the comms.
People who can make things happen are the backbone of this industry. All the credit goes to the creators, but it's the doers who are the real gold.
LBB> What were some of the biggest challenges on this project and what solutions did you come up with?
Graham> Switching from a ‘5’ to an ‘e’. It was a bit last minute and it did put the client in a difficult position, but we felt it was the right thing to do. The feeling of dread going to a meeting and thinking, ‘This is going to be rough’, and then being surprised at the openness of the client.
Getting into the iOS schedule was the most tricky part. It happens at two points during the year, and you have to wait till it's up and running. In the end, these are just realities you have to work with. Singapore is such an iPhone town, if you're not there, you're not here, if you know what I mean.
LBB> How is giga approaching its marketing differently from others in the region?
Graham> The essence of giga is that it ‘feels good’ – this came out of their Google reviews. giga is the most generous telco, offering endless rewards and giveaways. They are in the business of making the client feel good, and their 4.8 Google stars reflect this. This sets the mark. The work must make people feel good. It's got to bring joy and a smile.
Work for giga also needs to communicate that they are an innovative, digital-first company, which means this should be inherent in the work. When you don't have the resources of the bigger players that can just beat you into submission with media buys, we win through being joyful and unexpected – it's that 'feel good' thing again.
Last year we did a digital billboard that gave out data every time it rained. It was a huge success, helped by record-breaking rainfall statistics. This year we went big on ‘e’. The usual obstacles always apply (little time and budget) but we eat that for breakfast.
The client is brilliant and could not be more on board. Our tech partners fiddled away until not a single ‘e’ was missed. Writers wrote. Art people arted. And suits made it all flow. The date drifted backwards and forwards and that all goes into the 'useful' pot for future campaigns.
LBB> What was the most fun part of working on this project?
Graham> Asking all of Singapore to hunt for the most common letter in the language is a fun idea – it's also ingenious as it essentially turns almost any sign or piece of communication into our retail space. So we came up with all kinds of silly challenges to find 'e's in the most unexpected places.
A highlight was walking around stores and finding prizes that begin with the letter ‘e’. We left with Ewwww Eliminators, Energising Exerciser, an Elbow Enabler and Elegant Eyelash Extensions. It's all there if you keep your eyes open.
LBB> What was your reaction to the results? How did the brand react?
Graham> Chin Wei Li, the writer, had such praise from her mum, who described it as brilliant, astounding and the best ‘advertisement’ ever. Just as importantly, it didn't just work on mum. We're still counting, but so far [there’s been] a total of 27,000 new giga customers in the first month, daily customer acquisition increased by 100%, and [there was] approximately a 47% increase in daily customer acquisition in the first two weeks of the AR filter launch.
LBB> Anything else to add?
Graham> This didn't cost the earth. It's not rocket science. It's feel-good science. Advertising fundamentally has to inform – but it doesn't mean it can't entertain also. We all know how smartphones are; they can read text. This feature allowed us to enable everyone to play a game they could win and turn Singapore into a million billboards. The joy was seeing that people did play, and the responses were nuts. People found ‘e’s in cables, on vines and hand gestures. Seeing people respond creatively to the work left us all ebullient, exhilarated and ecstatic!
