2019 Winners & Shortlists

Why is this work relevant for Media?

Impactful media usually requires big spaces - but not in this case. We wanted to show the true power of the Riyal with our new low redemption rate and went ahead and used items worth that much to display this message. Customers were exposed to our campaign when they went shopping and saw items considered cheap, telling them they can win a trip of a lifetime if they just buy this item.

Background.

Qitaf, the loyalty program offered by STC is one of the best in the region. Rewards are very easy to redeem thanks to the number of partners accepting it as a payment method and the variety of those partners. However, usage is still low for Qitaf. Mainly because of the number of reward programs out there. From airlines to banks and malls – everyone is trying to gain customer loyalty through a reward program with redemption requiring a very high spend to convert into anything. To disrupt the loyalty programme landscape and to encourage usage, STC to use the World Cup as an opportunity and make the move to lower the redemption rate to 5 Qitaf points per transaction (worth 1 Saudi Riyal). So now Customers could redeem with as little as 1 riyal spend and enter the chance to win a trip to Russia.

Describe the creative idea/insights

“A riyal doesn’t go far anymore” The economy in Saudi Arabia is not in its best shape. Spending power is down and consumers are for the first time in years are counting every riyal they spend. What could buy you a drink and a snack 10-15 years ago cannot buy you anything today.1 With a drop in our minimum redemption to just 1 riyal (5 Qitaf points) we could bring back value to the one riyal for customers – demonstrating to them through qitaf that in fact the one riyal that they thought was worthless, could get them experiences to remember.

Describe the strategy.

Saudi STC customers: With the current economic downtown customers have become much more price conscious and are after experiences and products that deliver value for money.2 Being value conscious, loyalty programmes hold an appeal but with almost every brand offering a loyalty programme, with very high redemption rates, people were becoming frustrated with the amount of money that needed to be spent before they got something in return, and in an economic downturn this was not much of a return on investment. Which is why we took over cheap items at retailers and highlighted that this is something they can now redeem, and once they do - they will get the chance to experience a trip of a lifetime. .

Describe the execution.

The core of the campaign was to reflect the newly found power of the 1 Riyal thanks to our low redemption rate. We displayed a message on items considered cheap and told customers that redeeming this cheap item can get you the chance to win a trip of a lifetime. The campaign itself ran a couple of months before the world cup as the hype was building up and people starting to plan their trip to Russia.

List the results.

The campaign was a success across the board: The number of redeemed points increased by 676%(57,980 points to 391,995 points redeemed) in May (launch month) compared to the month before. 4 STC Users completely viewed video 800K+ times on YouTube A total of 64.7K Engagements & cost per engagement at $0.25 on Instagram