T-Mobile Flash Mob Research

Life's for Sharing.

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T-Mobile Life's for Sharing campaign - built around events that people want to take part in and then share with each other - has given us some epic TV executions that have generated huge response in other media. In this filmed session from Thinkbox's 'TV Response: the new rules' event, Sam Taylor, Head of Advertising and Sponsorships of T-Mobile, explains how this didn't just happen by accident and what he has learned about anticipating and maximising TV's effect on all response channels
The challenge for T-mobile in the UK was to own the sharing space without ramming mobile products down people's throats.
The campaign was launched on Channel4 with their Liverpool Street flashmob dance execution, and you can see how that looked in the ad-break here: a memorable moment to share, indeed.
In this film, Sam discusses the following:

• Was this an event, PR, viral of just good old fashioned TV advertising?
• How they made the most of their production investment by re-cutting the wealth footage to make product ads and releasing new material over 5 months
• The balance between brand TV and product demonstration or response ads.
• TV's role as "the best launch platform".
• How the ads performed (from awards to emotional scoring and consideration) and how DRTV responses were up over 50%, and TV becoming the most responsive DR channel, over press and over on-line.
• How to sweat your assets and how to drive impressions across different audiences and different channels.
• Engagement with Youtube and Facebook audiences and Peter Crouch!
• How Social networking was used to activate 13,000 people for the Trafalgar square T-mobile ad.
• How they came up with the 8th most successful interactive TV ad ever and reached the top of searched for ads on Google
• How other channels build on TV activity.
• The role of econometrics in maximizing effect of campaign elements
• The power of great content and great creativity

All in all, a brilliant campaign.

Notes from talk.
Sam Taylor, life’s for sharing.
'We had to do something different’ ‘you can’t help but pick up your phone and tell people, and thats the point of the campaign’ ‘showing what sharing is all about’

The one tv add drove lots of different exposures using different medias. ran for 5 month, only two weeks on TV advertising.
Behind the scene content.
-peter crouch, celebrity endorsements
-bloggers star with the celebrities to support the t-mobile brand for next ad campaign
Strictly comes dancing judges to judge the dancers
Online video campaign, 20-30
interactive tv
Gaming based on the flash mob
PR coverage based on the intent
Social media and blogging, low or no cost, huge amount of feedback
People copying event increases the t-mobile campaign
All planned before the ad itself.
Google search went up 38% on the night of the ad campaign.
20 million views online of the add.
18 million views on youtube
75% of people shared their video on Facebook

Source

The marketing challenge and brand insight:

Despite an innovative and competitive offering, T-Mobile had fallen behind its competitors. People simply didn't know what the brand stood for. The old model of advertising new tariffs just wasn't working; we had less money than our competitors, and our advertising wasn't cutting through.

We needed a fresh approach that would create some excitement around T-Mobile, get people talking about the brand; win back some customers; and launch the brand positioning: 'Life's for Sharing'.

The consumer insight and communications strategy:

If you ask people what they love about having a mobile phone, they constantly talk about being able to share interesting or unexpected things that happen to them in their everyday lives - by calling, or texting, or, as increasingly happens, recording and passing-on photos or video clips.

So we decided to create an event that would provide content that embodies 'Life's for Sharing', create such excitement that people would share it; and ultimately, make great advertising. Additionally, we wanted to build a community around this content, and make it easy to share using digital and social networks.

What better activity to get people involved than dancing - anyone can do it, it's infectious, it's great to watch when pros do it, and better to watch when people with two left feet try. What better medium than YouTube for us to partner with to provide a platform for people to share the content.

The creativity of the communication and activation:

The event featured 350 dancers who startled commuters at Liverpool Street station by breaking into a choreographed routine, hundreds of people couldn't help joining in. On the day of the event we set up a Life's for Sharing channel on YouTube. Soon after the event, footage was making its way on to YouTube, as people shared the surprise with their mates and anyone else who wanted to watch. We created a film of the event which premiered on TV just 36 hours after the shoot. Our 2½ minute film ran during Celebrity Big Brother and was introduced from within the programming by the announcer, which increased the sense of "event". The end-frame of the film directed viewers not to T-Mobile's webstore, as was usual for their advertising, but to the YouTube channel. This ignited the viral spread of the campaign. The channel quickly became a busy home for user generated content, as many people spoofed our film recreating the dance event in other unexpected places.

We also slow-released more content to the site including celebrities doing the T-Mobile dance and a "making of" video, ensuring there would be plenty of reasons to keep coming back to the channel. We used global-first aggregator technology which pulled the best, worst and weirdest dance clips from across the whole of YouTube to our channel, further enriching the content. We also seeded the digital content out to bloggers, who helped drive record-breaking views of the video on a global basis.

The results:

Viewing increased during our TV film premiere from 3 to 3.5 million. The film has been watched on YouTube over 12 million times with nearly 12,000 comments from consumers.

Our sponsored channel is the most viewed in the UK of all time, and the second most viewed globally. There are now more than 50 Dance Facebook groups, the largest of which has over 4,600 members. With 95,000 downloads in just two weeks, it was the most popular outdoor Bluetooth campaign to date. Search volumes on "T-Mobile" went up by 38% during the campaign. From campaign launch, T-Mobile's word of mouth tracking more than doubled, making it the category leader.

Most importantly, in a year when national high street sales were at an all time low, T-Mobile stores received record footfall. Handset sales went up 22% during launch week. In the height of a recession T-Mobile sales grew a massive 52% on the same time the previous year. 80% of these were at the intended top end of the market who spend more than £30 a month.