2016 Winners & Shortlists

Brief Explanation

The on-going political instability in Iraq, is increasing the cultural and social divide between Arabs and Kurds. Consumers don’t necessarily choose operators based on how good they are but rather whether or not they are Kurdish or Arabic. Asiacell is a company with a nationwide ambition that wanted to reinforce its presence in its competitors’ strongholds and start being seen as the operator of all the Iraqis by bringing people together and bridging gaps. Therefore, we wanted Asiacell to be the champion of Iraq’s unity by changing the conversation from what makes Iraqis different to what unites them.

Results and Effectiveness

Online, our campaign reached over 14 million Iraqis from both communities of which almost 500,000 positively reacted, commented and shared. What is even more remarkable for an Iraqi campaign is that we managed to equally reach both communities; 41% of Kurds (2,545,177 out of 6,500,00) as well as 31% of Arabs (11,152.800 out of 33,400,000). The emotional and entertainment value of our content also increased the performance of the Asiacell playlist on Anghami (regional leading music streaming platform) with almost 3 million stream, 44% more than competitors' playlists with an average time of 40 minutes spent on our playlist.

Creative Execution

Prior to the campaign, we used social media to get people to contribute to the lyrics of the song that would unite them. Once we had the song it was aired on TV stations and online, with the support of traditional media. We were careful to ensure both communities were equally and fully covered. To break the media “borders” the media team were able to have our material aired in spite of the fact that it had both Arabic and Kurdish content in one edit. We managed to have one song that both Kurds and Arabs can relate to.

Insights, Strategy and the Idea

The campaign targeted Kurds and Arabs at large. We wanted existing client to be proud to belong to an operator that embraced all Iraqis and for potential customers to want to be part of an operator that believed in a higher cause and unity; and acted upon it. At a time where Iraqis are divided more than ever, at a time where they consume very different content, we gave them a song and its video clip that had meaning for all of them and that provided an equal moment of emotion and entertainment to everyone in the country.