Watch the video on our Media Week award-winning campaign - which won Gold for Sales Pitch under £250K.

Background

Mediaedge:CIA (MEC) started working on the Orange business early last year and right away they were determined to work with media owners to help develop great advertising for their client. The main push in 2009 was for Orange Wednesdays - an on going offer and unique benefit for Orange customers to take advantage of 2-for-1 cinema tickets every Wednesday.

The Brief

On the back of a very successful but finite TV advertising campaign for Orange Wednesdays in the first half of 2009 (The Wicked Witch of the West), MEC and Orange briefed media owners to create a vehicle to continue the momentum of the campaign amongst young adults and add relevance and interest to the offer. They wanted to achieve an even closer association with cinema film releases. The budget for this was much tighter and they were keen to find an innovative solution.

The Pitch

Channel 4 was one of many media owners pitching for this specific activity. We had to come up with an idea that would deliver a regular presence (Aug 09 - Jan 10) and achieve stand out. No easy task with a limited £0.25m budget.

The Big Idea

We recreated the much-loved film trailer reel you see at the cinema - in your home.

A destination TV ad break from Orange every week.

Using the C4 weekly omnibus tracking study (a sample of 1000 people), we asked 16-34 adults if a TV ad break that featured only film trailers would be of interest to them. Over three quarters replied yes. We knew we were onto something.

Although this was a first, we felt confident that we could persuade film distributors to advertise in the same break (something they had not previously done on TV). Orange Wednesdays would effectively look like the sponsor and partner of the film trailer break (see attached visual re Orange bumpers and idents in the movie zone break). The film advertisers paid for their trailer spots, effectively enabling Orange to get something they couldn't afford on their own.

A big media idea, without a big price tag.

The contents of the break change each week and is shown every Tuesday evening - on Channel 4 (just after Hollyoaks), E4 (just before the next episode of Hollyoaks), Film4 (9pm movie) and youth orientated programming online (4oD) - all key times for targeting the elusive young movie goer (reaching over 30% of them during the six month period, with regular frequency).

Working closely with Orange, MEC and ex 4Creative producers, the Channel 4 sales dept helped develop the creative work for this cross-platform proposal.

Results

Across the board, the results have been excellent, confirming a high return on investment. Independent research amongst 16-34s from Continental has been 100% positive:

• Massive awareness - 2 out of 3 viewers recalled seeing the movie zone
• High engagement - 80% liked the new break and over 70% paid more attention to it
• Positive brand Image - viewers were more likely to trust & recommend Orange to others
• Happy film distributors - viewers were more likely to go and see the featured films

We also achieved huge click-thru rates on 4oD - reaching 9% in some weeks (compared with a 2.5% norm). True engagement.

Natasha Watkinson (Senior Media Manager, Orange) - "we are really pleased with the positive results so far and how everyone got behind this creative platform to make it happen"

Ian Stevens (Group Account Director, MEC) - "the pitch from Channel 4 was outstanding and like all good ideas, it was a simple and compelling use of their media"

Reflecting the success of this particular activity, MEC and Orange renewed the 6 month deal with C4 earlier this year.

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