2018 Winners & Shortlists

The Campaign

#SavingsExcuse was a thought provoking campaign that encouraged UAE residents to honestly look at their reasons for not saving. By posing the question, “what’s your saving excuse” the campaign sought to actively engage, and educate the public on saving solutions. To incentivise online conversations, National Bonds offered the chance to win 100,000 AED by sharing their 'excuses' using the hashtag, #SavingsExcuse. Overall the campaign was designed to shine a positive light on a sensitive financial topic that many of us feel guilt towards.

Creative Execution

National Bonds launched a digitally-driven campaign asking the public to share their #SavingsExcuse for a chance to win AED 100,000. The campaign launched on 1 November - 1 January and was underpinned by outdoor, digital and social media advertising. Working with influencers, National Bonds curated content to drive campaign engagement. Virgin radio DJ Kris Fade, Comedian Wonho Chung and social commentator Khalid Al Ameri, all shared their ‘excuses’ across social media using their own unique tone of voice. A media audit was also held ahead the campaign launch to source journalist ‘excuses' which were used to create a unique gift for each reporter alongside the campaign press kit. The campaign media kit included top-line statistics highlighting the lack of savings in the UAE to drive media headlines. Activity was supplemented by outdoor and digital ads, all designed to drive conversations online and around the campaign hashtag: #SavingsExcuse.

The Savings Excuse campaign garnered: - 8.7 million impressions - 41.18 percent engagement rate - 50.35k interactions - 499k impressions around the Twitter hashtag #SavingsExcuse - 218,275 page views (Savings Excuse website) - 60+ pieces of coverage across top-tier media titles - 100 percent key message penetration - 3,362 new business leads - 984 qualified leads

Using an integrated approach spanning digital, outdoor and media, National Bonds successfully sparked conversations across the emirates through a carefully coordinated and integrated campaign across offline and online channels. Key highlights: - Campaign website launch - Social media competition on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram - Campaign hashtag launch (#SavingsExcuse) - Influencer engagement and content amplification - Outdoor and digital advertising campaign across the UAE - Nationwide media campaign launch (media campaign included: CEO profiling, media briefings and thought leadership). - Campaign Middle East's 'Top 30 campaigns of 2017'

To engage audiences across the UAE, National Bonds launched a digitally-driven campaign, ably supported by advertising and PR, designed to instil a culture of savings across the emirates. National Bonds aimed to target UAE residents (nationals and expatriates alike). Given the breadth of the demographic this was a huge undertaking. According to National Bonds data, there is an appetite among UAE residents to save but a disconnect between the desire to save and regular savers. Could National Bonds bridge this gap? Instead of dictating the importance of saving, National Bonds wanted to start an open discussion about why people find it so hard to save in the UAE with a view to eradicate the stigma associated with financial woes. The first step in bridging this gap would be to spark conversations about individual barriers to saving in an open and transparent way.