Reader, we are 11 days away from the biggest night in advertising—the B&T Awards.
On 8 November, we’ll be taking over the Hordern Pavilion in Sydney to reveal who is at the top of their game and which campaigns topped the leaderboard for creativity and effectiveness.
There is still time to buy your tickets, too. Get in now before it’s too late!
But before then, we’re taking a look at the finalists for the Best TV Campaign! You can check out the rest of the finalists in the other categories here.
Here’s a look at the finalists in their own words and in no particular order.
Akcelo, “Go to Better Sleep”, Forty Winks
Australia’s leading mattress company, Forty Winks, has provided quality sleep for 40 years. But in 2023, the brand felt tired, with a declining market share and a lack of appeal to younger demographics.
To position Forty Winks as the industry authority on sleep, we leveraged a horrifying statistic – almost 50% of all Australian adults report at least two recurring sleep issues.
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‘Go to better sleep’ shows the horror of poor sleep in its many forms. The campaign introduces Australia to ‘The Unslept’ – an uncanny horde of Mouth Breathers, Side Sleepers, Toss ‘n’ Turners, Cover Snatchers, Hot Sleepers, Doom Scrollers, and more, each representing the various sleep issues faced by millions.
The 360 launch included a Brand Film, OOH and Product Films, as well as character profiles on Radio and Social. Beyond the launch, these sleepless sensations have also become a regular feature in Forty Winks’ monthly retail campaigns.
After launching with a brand TVC, our Unslept characters made their way into monthly retail films, breathing new life and physical comedy into the sales messaging. Product-focused films allowed us to show Forty Winks staff solving various ‘Unslept’ conditions with Forty Winks products.
BMF, “Go Big on the Little Things”, ALDI Australia
At a time when supermarkets shout about turkey and hams, ALDI believes Christmas is made great by everything surrounding the main players too. After all, a ham without sides is just a ham.
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By celebrating the many LITTLE things that make Christmas lunch, we proved ALDI’s quality seasonal range at everyday-low-prices could help Aussies afford a BIG value Christmas to be proud of.
Bullfrog, “Black Smithery”, Interpath
Interpath needed to launch their first-to-market joint pain relief supplement, Epijoint, but in talking to osteoarthritis sufferers, it became immediately clear that they faced a significant market challenge. Following years of untreatable pain, our audience frankly didn’t believe that anything was capable of easing what ails them. If this new supplement could truly ease arthritic joint pain, we needed to prove it.
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To create the authenticity and disruption the product deserved, we traded tired testimonials for unexpected and entertaining stories, like that of Patricia, a septuagenarian with a passion for blacksmithery.
This lovingly crafted film stars our blacksmith, as observed by her bemused husband. Casting relatable characters instead of generic stereotypes was an intentional decision to highlight that this is not just another same-same product.
While the category is content to show osteoarthritis sufferers reclaiming their everyday lives, packed with beach walking and lawn bowl cliches, our storytelling was designed to show people they could reclaim more than that. With Epijoint, they can move however they feel like moving, even if it’s in the direction of a forge.
Howatson+Company, “Tyroflage”, Tyro
Bringing obsession to life in a slightly extreme but totally helpful way for Tyro:
We revived the flagging fortunes of Tyro Australia’s original fintech disruptor. ‘Into business big time’ showcases the obsessive lengths they’ll go to help their core customers succeed with bespoke solutions across payments, banking and lending.
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We repositioned the brand with an integrated campaign, built around a series of TV ads playfully showcasing their staff literally getting inside their customers businesses to better power their success.
We see staff members hiding in the walls, behind ceiling fans or inside glass vitrines – observing, learning and making sure a business owner is cool, calm and in control. Each film demonstrates multiple features of Tyro product – from pay at the table or seeing their daily takings appearing in their account.
In a banal category filled with unhelpful messages of ‘we back small business’, these somewhat extreme but totally helpful scenarios demonstrating both an unexpected commitment to customer success, and how Tyro create solutions uniquely shaped around the businesses they serve.
The campaign launched with a 4-week burst on TV across Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane delivering 5,119 spots and extended nationally across BVOD and YouTube. It delivered over 92m impressions across the four-month period reaching 57% of 18+ Australian population across TV, OOH, BVOD, YouTube, Social and Audio.
These achievements resulted in record-breaking unprompted awareness, which soared to 12% from 8% according to RFI tracking. A crucial metric of brand health, Trust, also saw an increase of 16 points, reaching a high of 54%. Consideration amongst merchants also at a record high of 33%, up 5 points.
Howatson+Company”, Always Free, Always Entertaining”, ABC
With streaming subscription prices increasing and cost of living at an all-time high, millions of people are being forced to choose which streaming service to cancel. Netflix or Prime? Disney+ or Apple TV?
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As a completely free streaming service, with world-class drama, comedy, sport, news, and more, ABC iview created a witty mini period drama to show it’s the one streamer Aussies never need to cancel.
Howatson+Company, “Know What We Know”, Domain
Domain are a distant number two in a duopoly market. Outnumbered by REA means competing on spend isn’t possible.
Domain needed to commit to a long-term enduring brand platform that delivered scale, confidence, and distinctiveness.
Rather than challenging the competition with messaging based on rational features, we chose to challenge the market.
Significant quantitative, qualitative and discovery research uncovered an ownable opportunity.
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Property is an emotional rollercoaster — people feel overwhelmed and overlooked. There’s an overload of one-size-fits-all information, without much support.
Domain’s approach was to humanise the conversation, shifting from being seen as a source of information to a source of guidance throughout the journey.
To get Domain noticed and remembered, punching above its weight for salience, we used the marketing science of distinctiveness over difference – standing for something people could connect with.
The brand platform ‘Know what we know’ reflects Domain’s commitment to power customers with generous insight and confidence.
In execution, we made sure people could emotionally relate to the film. We comedically showed the lengths people go to in finding the right property, positioning Domain as the solution for any search.
To drive salience, we cast Hollywood couple Rose Byrne and Bobby Cannavale to star in the campaign. Our investment in celebrity talent acted as a proxy for scale and trust, making the brand feel bigger and bolder than it had ever before.
Our media plan readjusted the spend back towards brand rather than short term digital media. We delivered a high impact strategy of 60” roadblocks at launch and in tent pole TV moments like ‘The Block’.
We also localised messages by area to further promote features like ‘school zones’ in OOH.
Our ‘Know what we know’ messaging became part of all brand comms, pulling through to B2B sales kits and internal messaging.
Innocean, “Kia is Getting a Ute”, Kia Australia
PROBLEM:
The Aussie ‘ute’ is a unique category, famed for its toughness, ruggedness, and well, it’s Aussie-ness.
Kia was launching its first ute ever—the Kia Tasman—but there were a couple of issues:
Kia couldn’t show the ute as it was still in development.
Kia’s never made an off-road vehicle before, meaning the brand lacked ute category credentials.
Given that the average ute buying cycle takes 18 months, building salience and equity around the Tasman now was critical to see success at launch.
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INSIGHT:
Aussies love their sporting icons. They revere them for many of the same reasons they do their utes. They’re reliable, tough, and can overcome any challenge.
STRATEGY:
As we couldn’t show our ute, we used Aussie sporting icons as our proxy. UFC champions embodied Tasman’s toughness. Rugby players, it’s reliability.
Any association we wanted to reinforce, we found a sporting legend to match.
EXECUTION:
We based our premise on a uniquely Australian idiosyncrasy: the nickname. Our flagship TVC focused on our sporting icons’ quest to get the ute named after them, inextricably linking the Tasman to their character.
This culminated in the reveal of its true, distinctly Aussie name—the Kia Tasman. Loaded with ockerisms, humour, and charm, our campaign was built to embed the Tasman not just in Aussie culture, but in Aussie folklore.
RESULTS:
After generating 97 million earned impressions and 300+ pieces of editorial coverage, 86% of 4-year ute considerers now consider a Kia ute.
Kia was now set up for launch success, with nameplate recognition and equity skyrocketing. Versus pre-campaign levels, we increased;
-Knowledge that Kia’s getting a ute +96%
-‘Kia Tasman’ name recognition +76%
-‘Toughness’ associations +39%
-‘Australian’ associations +26%
-‘Good for off-roading’ associations +51% (remember, Kia has never had an off-road vehicle in its 27 years in Australia)
-‘Reliable’ associations +18%
Ogilvy, “When the Lucky Country Isn’t so Lucky”, AAMI
The luckiest new brand platform of 2024.
AAMI is a much-loved brand in Australia, having been closely linked with iconic campaigns in its storied past. Marking a shift from the 2020 release of ‘AAMI Does’, the new 2024 brand platform embraces the quirks and challenges of Australia. This shift brings renewed focus back to AAMI’s long-standing tagline : Lucky you’re with AAMI.
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Launched across TV, cinema, BVOD and online, plus OOH, and audio.
The campaign launch combined Dorothea Mackellar’s poem ‘My Country’, juxtaposed with uniquely Australian scenes of misfortune that our lucky country sometimes faces. Scenes that everyday Australians can relate to, providing a moment to enjoy the distinctly Aussie humour being played out on-screen.
Special Group, “Get Almost Almost Anything “, Uber Australia
Although online delivery of groceries had high penetration, it was anchored in next-day delivery by the supermarket giants. On-demand delivery had the potential to disrupt people’s habits, yet to capitalise on this opportunity, we would need to move fast, and significantly shift people’s attitudes towards (a) how they saw the Uber Eats brand (for indulgent takeaway moments), and (b) grocery shopping (a much more rational, everyday need-state).
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We needed to normalise and be salient for getting ANYTHING delivered on demand.
Moving the brand…
From: a place to get whatever I want to eat for a treat-night dinner.
To: a place to get whatever I want, whenever I want it.
Leaning into the truth that Uber Eats can’t actually deliver you absolutely anything, we launched another burst of ‘Get Almost Almost Anything’ with Tom Felton & Nicola Coughlan.