2017 Winners & Shortlists

THIS IS NOT A PIECE OF CAKE

BrandHSBC
Product/ServiceHSBC'S 70TH ANNIVERSARY
EntrantMINDSHARE DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES
CategorySocial Purpose
Idea Creation MINDSHARE DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES
Media Placement MINDSHARE DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES
Production BOOMTOWN PRODUCTIONS Dubai, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES

The Campaign

INSIGHTS: -When you invite people to celebrate your birthday, you serve them a piece of birthday cake. -HSBC’s main existence lies in Supporting their customers in reaching their ambitions. Their Human ambitions. IDEA: AMBITION. IT’S NOT A PIECE OF CAKE. THE AMBITION RECIPE. ‘Supporting Human Ambition’, HSBC’s brand positioning and tagline, had to be a core message takeout from the brand video. In parallel, we needed to create engaging content and not just a generic bank ad. So we broke down the phases in life that one has to go through, in order to overcome obstacles and achieve their ambition. We narrated that in a metaphorical visual; directly comparing the journey of human ambition to that of baking a birthday cake! The video concludes with a finished cake as a celebratory end note and the process was labeled ‘this is not a piece of cake’ to describe human ambition.

Creative Execution

We began the execution by selecting cake recipe actions that carefully fit the metaphor of human ambition. To create a compelling story, we composed the script to carry out dual meaning throughout the video while having a single goal in mind: ‘empowering the viewer’. Finally, in order to entice curiosity and achieve the highest level of engagement, logos and branding were intentionally put on hold until the last second of the video. This was essential to achieving the highest view-ability rate possible.

Our 80-second video achieved over 5 million impressions on Facebook with an above average view & share rate (20% & 12% respectively). As for Youtube, the video became the best performing video on HSBC’s channel, with a view rate 30% higher than any other content and with a cost-per-view that is 300% more effective than the category average! The Masthead impressions were approaching 17 million which lead to an increase in channel subscriptions of 26% in a couple of days only. The best campaign result was the amazing customer responses received. We enjoyed reading them all, but our favorite was when a user requested to get a ‘piece of cake’ and along with HSBC we responded by sending him the full cake from the video.

Our strategy focused on observing how, when, and what content users consume and then embedding these key findings to construct our video. Our key findings were: 1. Food recipes were highly trending however not considered content that interrupts or disrupts. That is why our use of food ingredients in the video was metaphorical to increase viewers’ curiosity and attentiveness to the ending climax. 2. Video production that resembles advertisement is highly skipped. That is why our production value was composed in a balanced manner to ensure that it fits natively in users’ newsfeeds.

Credits

Name Company Role
Tuki Ghiassi Mindshare Creative Director
Ammar Safi Mindshare Art Director
Tuki Ghiassi, Maha Khawaja Mindshare Copywriters
Zahi Lawand, Faris Sibai Mindshare Client Services Directors
Heba Attallah Mindshare Senior Media Manager
George Chivi Mindshare Integrated Media Planner
Shane Martin Boomtown Director
Zubin Mistry Boomtown Director of Photography
Daniel Kilalea Boomtown Producer
Hanna Paronen Boomtown Production Manager
Ian Murphy Boomtown 2nd Unit Camera
Juleta Hirner Boomtown Food Stylist
Links
Social Media URL   |   Video URL