Special and Partners Life created one of the most memorable campaigns in recent years with an innovative, exciting and outside-the-box execution that brought the insurance sector to life by waking the dead.
The campaign scooped a bunch of awards — including several B&T Awards last year — and delivered impressive results for Partners Life in what was one of the most under-insured markets in the world. But what did Special and Partners Life do to make this campaign a game-changer?
B&T sat down with Tina Morgan and Kris Ballantyne, GM marketing and chief customer officer at Partners Life, respectively, and Jonathan McMahon, chief creative officer, Special New Zealand to find out why this campaign became an award winner.
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B&T: This campaign required a lot more moving parts than simply creating a TVC to run at the end of the show. Why was that approach necessary?
Jonathan McMahon: Despite being a country that doesn’t want to talk about death and life insurance, we certainly enjoy our murder mystery shows and content. So we thought we would talk to them in a place they were comfortable with the subject.
The approach added to the viewer experience, where we had a large captive audience and an idea with the ability to break through to them and create talkability. So by having the characters from the show talk about their lives in the episode, along with having it air within the programme (before the credits), we kept the viewers’ attention and reached them in a way they had never experienced.
If this were to run after the show, we were at risk of losing the authenticity of being in the show and losing viewers due to them changing the channel or going to the bathroom.
Tina Morgan: It definitely required a lot of moving parts — multiple parties committed to the cause and focussed on creating something really special and unique, in a category that’s well known for its traditional and boring approach — add Covid restrictions in the middle of it all to boot!
We wanted to provoke what is really quite an apathetic audience towards life and health insurance into taking some action – so the creative needed to be provocative and brave. Embedding it into NZ’s favourite murder mystery series seemed like the perfect place to talk about life insurance.
A key learning from a previous TV integration told us we needed to capture the audience while they were still engaged in the show. So we knew we needed to tell the story before the credits rolled.
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Kris Ballantyne: New Zealand is a country with a deeply held aversion to talking about both money and the idea of ‘bad things happening’.
Traditional TVCs, even well-crafted ones, placed at the end of a popular show are still unfortunately too easy to ‘turn off’ for viewers. Bearing in mind that the product category Partners Life is trying to sell is a morbid, uncomfortable one which even in markets with high penetration is considered a grudge purchase at best.
That’s why our interest was well and truly piqued at the idea of hijacking the actual media placement in such an unusual manner – yes it required a lot of moving parts, yes it limits the potential reach to viewers of that specific show and yes the creative territory is quite uncharted and potentially risky, but the upside of actually getting the core product message across in a way that is not only heard, but enjoyed was too unique to pass up for us.
B&T: Why should brands and agencies look to play in culture as you did with this campaign? And what should others know before taking on a task like this?
JM: As an industry, we need to be continuously looking for new ways to reach our audiences. There are more media channels than ever before, viewers double screen, and people even pay money not to view ads.
However, audiences want to be entertained, so if you’re going to interrupt their entertainment you’d better be interesting.
Being relevant and playing in culture keeps brands current and in the public eye. As for what they should know, well, sometimes it can be hard, and long (depending on their mission), so if you want to do it well, it’s going to take a team effort and patience.
TM: Perseverance pays off! Bringing a client, a creative agency, a TV network and a production company together is no mean feat. But when everyone can see the end game is magic, and the client is focused on disrupting the insurance category, disruptive comms is a natural follow-on.
KB: From the client point of view – we saw so many of our direct competitor brands offshoring their advertising and brand-building content from regional/global head offices for years, completely missing the pulse of the local culture of NZ entirely. The most common examples were Insurers bringing their advertising strategy wholesale from Australia to New Zealand – the culture of the two countries seem quite similar from the outside, but on the inside, they are vastly different.
Tapping into the cultural zeitgeist of New Zealand by understanding and respecting the barriers to why Kiwis were not engaging with traditional advertising messaging for our category is critical to both brand positioning, but also effectiveness. Something as basic as respecting the style of humour most popular in the market (sarcastic, deadpan humour in the case of New Zealand) is so important because failing that just immediately puts your brand into the same territory as ‘those other guys from overseas trying to sell me something’.
New Zealand is one of the most under-insured countries in the world. Can creativity change that?
JM: Yeah, absolutely. Creativity can change the way we travel, where we stay, the way we communicate, the way we build, the way we learn – everything. So I can’t see why it couldn’t change people’s attitudes and approach to being insured.
TM: Traditional, soft creative isn’t moving the dial – NZ remains one of the most uninsured countries in the OECD. Our “she’ll be right” attitude doesn’t help.
Taking an innovative and creative approach to every facet of our business, including marketing, product design and the way our customers do business with us, we believe, will give Kiwis a nudge in the right direction to protecting themselves for when ‘life happens’. At Partners Life, one of our values is being ‘always restless’ and it really drives a creative and innovative culture, and a strong desire to push boundaries.
KB: It certainly can’t hurt. The scale of the problem is significant, and there are many factors playing into the under-insurance gap.
Creativity can certainly help break down some of the cultural taboos and barriers to allow Kiwis to actually start thinking and talking about their financial risks, but equally important is going to be a continued push towards financial literacy. Not only are Kiwis under-insured, but they are also frequently under-equipped to deal with the challenges of the modern financial landscape. Could creativity be used to help break down that barrier too – almost certainly, however realistically it’s going to require creativity and effort from more than just one brand!
Why did you choose to enter the B&T with this campaign?
JM: As a creative born in Melbourne and having worked there for the first three and a half years of my career, B&T was always one of those magazines that would do the rounds in the office and you’d read through it to be up-to-date on all things in our industry.
Despite my moving countries, it doesn’t stop the fact that it’s a leading publisher for advertising, marketing and media.
So we enter the B&T Awards to be up against the best work from the region and judged by some great minds.
TM: Simple – great ideas need to be shared by the best!
KB: Because we are incredibly proud of our brand, and all of our campaigns – with the shining jewel being The Last Performance. We think this is a truly transformative and unique piece of work that is absolutely worth celebrating.
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What makes the best work stand out from the crowd?
JM: Something original; never been seen. Something extremely crafted well. Preferably both.
Some can craft themselves to glory, but sometimes you see great ideas that haven’t had the care or love or money or thought to push them to where they need to be. It’s about making it special and making it too good to be ignored.
TM: It’s got to be clever, it needs to be in tune with the psyche and cultural nuances of the audience you’re talking to – and it’s got to invoke that feeling of ‘hell yes – let’s do it’ with your client!
KB: There’s a sweet spot that is very difficult to find – the happy median between clever, culturally relevant, timely and well-executed. It’s not easy to articulate what makes a great piece stand out from the good – but you know it when you see it.
