The Human Jukebox
Issue 19 | June 2011
Agency
Akestam Holst
Creative Team
Creative Director: Andreas Ullenius; Art Director: Petra Albrektson; Copywriter: Joakim Lebraaten; Account Director: Henrik Adenskog; Account Manager: Anna Nolendorfs
Production Team
Web Production: From Stockholm With Love; PR: Claes Delin, 88 Grader; Social Media Advisory: Kollektivet Livet; Technical Advisor: Johan Albrektson, SystemsGo
Date
November 2010
Background
The brief was to tell people that, when it comes to customized sound systems, Pause is the best there is.
Idea
Pause is a small player in the dog-eat-dog world of Hi-Fi retailing in Scandinavia with its big chains and their big media budgets.
So the task was to make as much noise as possible with a story that would interest and intrigue people. The target audience, then, became the people who could help Pause reach The People – journalists and bloggers.
The story they were invited to pass on was how Fredrik Hielmquist, CEO of Pause, became the first human jukebox.
Sharing his passion for customized, purpose-built sound systems, on November 26th 2010 he swallowed a tiny but powerful music player. It worked like any jukebox except you had to select the songs you wanted to play at www.thehumanjujkebox.se
Results
The campaign broke even after only 6 days, increasing sales by 112 % compared to last year’s campaign period. Store visits increased about 400%, and traffic to the web store over 600%.
Our Thoughts
Oh those clever Swedes, no wonder thet=y are higher in the creativity league tables than counytries three or four times their size. The ingenious parts of this, once you get past the technological achievement of Fredrik Hielmquist in making such a perfectly functioning h-fi system in pill format, is the way it was cionnected to Spotify. And the way people were invited to play songs not by pushing a coin in a slot but by dedicating them to friends in social media. So thousands of people shared the idea as well as sharing the music.
The bit that made me wince on the video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xyMLSlh8914" target="_blank">www.youtube.com/watch?v=xyMLSlh8914) was seeing Fredrik coming out of the chemist’s with, firstly, Imodium to plug everything in, and, secondly, laxatives to let it all go.