2015 Winners & Shortlists

The Campaign

We wanted to transform people’s behavior by raising awareness towards the International Arabic Language Day and increasing Arabic online content. So when the opportunity risen with the launch of Samsung Note 4 which has the capability of recognizing Arabic handwriting, we instantly jumped on board. Our main goal was to reinstall pride in our language and remind people how beautiful the Arabic letters are, encouraging them to revive the Arabic language online. We decided to launch our event # بكتب_بالعربي 10 days prior to the Arabic language day (December 18th) capitalizing on this in order to create viral effect among the Arabic speaking world. Through media relations, we were able to feature key media influencers on radio and video (online) to invite people to revive the Arabic language online and to join us under # بكتب_بالعربي. On ground, Samsung promoters roamed through malls equipped with an application allowing people to write in Arabic and share whatever they’ve written online. We placed two huge digital outdoor screens in the busiest part of Amman, where people started reading the online posts and where invited to contribute to the hashtag in Arabic. Numerous social media influencers received a unique invitation to participate in our initiative, the Ctrl-Alt keyboard buttons (universal language switch keys) and they all gladly did.

The Brief

413 million users in the Arab world are projected to be on the Internet by 2015, yet only 3% of current online content is in Arabic. We wanted to target Arabs in the region that used Arabeezi online. These people found it "uncool" or "difficult" to write Arabic content using Arabic letters and rathered English letters to write Arabic words. Therefore, we wanted to: - Capitalize on the Arabic Language Day (18th November) - Encourage people to use Arabic letters on SM platforms, inorder to increase online Arabic content - Minimize the gap between technology and the Arabic Language

Results

On the 18th the # was used in Arabic sentences more than 25,000 times Our messaged reached 177 million out of 422 million Arabic speakers The average use of our hashtag was 25 tweets per hour in Arabic The hashtag scored 821’104’000 impressions The effect was so massive that we were featured in the news. Almost every local radio station, newspaper and online news portal mentioned our hashtag, also inviting people to write in Arabic. We were even mentioned in some international TV stations. Our hashtag was one of the most trending in the Arab world. The initiative and the hashtag where adopted by so many brands. Even the Jordanian royal family, acknowledged the initiative and hashtag to support us on their personal social media pages. Our movement gave birth to 122,000 online posts written in Arabic, reminded 177 million people of the beauty of our language

Execution

We decided to launch our event # بكتب_بالعربي 10 days prior to the Arabic language day (December 18th) capitalizing on this in order to create viral effect among the Arabic speaking world. We started with radio ads, featuring key media influencers inviting people to revive the Arabic language online and to join us under # بكتب_بالعربي We supported our radio spots through viral interviews with influential people and opinion leaders, who adopted the cause and where glad to talk about it and spread it. We came up with trendy and hip designs of the 28 alphabets of the Arabic language and invited people to use them, share them and to start writing in Arabic online. We created an event in which people were invited to join us in celebration of the Arabic language on the 18th of December. Samsung promoters roamed through malls equipped with an application

The Situation

We had several challenges to encounter: - People perceive the Arabic language a difficult language to use, lacking modern relevance in regards to social media platforms. - People whose mother language is Arabic tend to use "arabeezi" on social media platform

The Strategy

The big idea was an amplification of an initial campaign launched by Samsung earlier . It was based around a hastag created under #بكتب_بالعربي We asked people to prove their commitment to the initiative by using the hashtag with anything they write in Arabic. This way we generated Arabic content and changed behavior from one side, and smartly injected the initiative DNA in the content people develop from another. We started by inviting people that have influence on social media to support the initiative by changing their profile picture and celebrating the Arabic Language day using Arabic letters. Through our media relations, we asked people from TV, RADIO, MAGAZINES, FACEBOOK, TWITTER AND NEWSPAPERS to participate in their own way. We also planned an internal campaign with giveaways for Samsung employees to encourage participation from within. It started with an email from the (Korean) president written in Arabic to encourage participation.