Raging Banners
VOO Telecom
Issue 53 | December 2019
Agency
Happiness, Brussels
Creative Team
Chief Creative Officer: Geoffrey Hantson Executive Creative Director: Katrien Bottez Creative Director: Philippe Fass Creatives: Mattias Lemielle, Jeremy Stoquart
Production Team
Head of Production: Bart Vande Maele Digital Producer: Kris Van Wallendael Head of Technology: Thomas Colliers Motion Designers: Simon Schuurman, Remke Faber Head of Project Management: Na Nguyen Project Manager: Vietdong Ngo
Other Credits
Strategy Director: Isabelle Koelman Account Director: Mattias Vermeire Account Manager: Coline Hercot
Date
October 2019
Background
VOO Telecom is Belgium’s biggest Telecom Challenger. Since the internet has become so much part of our daily life, one of the main battlefields and reasons to switch provider is the speed of the internet provider. VOO Telecom has invested in modern technology and, because of that, is able to offer customers speeds up to four times faster than their biggest competitor, the market leader.
Brief: gain market share (and share of heart) within the fast-growing Belgian gaming community because becoming the brand of choice in that community would be proof of the ‘internet-leadership’ of VOO Telecom.
Idea
To promote Belgium’s fastest internet, VOO telecom teamed-up (paid) with the most influential gaming streamers who were not yet VOO clients. They were asked to download a plug-in, which attached itself to the microphone of their computers.
Microsoft cognitive software transcribed what gamers were shouting whenever they became enraged by the slow speeds of their internet connection.
When a gamer shouted, “fu**ing shi**y internet” at his/her computer, an animated overlay popped up on his screen for all his followers on YouTube Live and Twitch to see, repeating the words ‘Fu**ing shi**y’ internet followed by the message, ‘Stop raging, switch to 4x faster internet.’ This use of audio technology was a first.
Results
The ‘raging banners’ turned into a real economical multiplier for VOO. Via their influencers and their lagging internet, the 'raging banners' quickly appeared on hundreds of real-time streams and reaching 85% of the Belgian gaming community within a few weeks.
This led to hundreds of positive engagements, an increase of 165% of the VOO ‘fast internet’ webpages, a radical increase when it comes to VOO brand preference within that community and most importantly, leading to an increase in sales of over 20%! Challenger VOO is now close to becoming the market leader.
Our Thoughts
Gamers are very important to marketers for two reasons. One, they are a very large and influential audience (4.2 million in a 2018 Newzo survey, 36% of the country’s entire population). Two, they are young and very difficult to reach through traditional media.
If you talk to them through their heroes and you’re both witty and relevant, then you can expect great results. Mind you, it helps if you have a product with demonstrable superiority, which doesn’t happen that often these days