CASE STUDY: How Mizone grew sales with British game show concept

Background

The Mizone brand's aspiration was to get Chinese consumers ready for life's challenges. Being an isotonic drink, it is meant to restore energy levels after exercise. However, the general Chinese population is not interested in exercising, making the original product positioning of functionality useless in China.

Appealing to consumers' quest for success in life by getting their minds and bodies to an ideal physical and psychological state worked better for the brand, against competitors such as Pocari Sweat and Suntory Vitamin Water. The campaign objective was business growth of more than half. 

Execution

The challenge was to identify appropriate branded content that would stand out in a diverse media environment in China. Considering the popularity of copyrighted programs abroad, British game show The Cube was localised for China after talks with the organisers since June 2011, and the content enhanced to increase interaction with the target audience. In the localisation process, visible elements like the title rights and logos of the game show were naturally integrated with the Mizone name as well as the shape of the bottle to amplify customised brand equity.

Fuse China, OMG's sponsorship and branded content strategy division, and OMD China's planning team, used a combination of cross-media communication channels to reach out to the target audience. They also associated the game show's format of challenges to be completed inside a cube with consumers' state of readiness for life's random challenges.

TV media was the core, supported by all-rounded publicity on Sina, Youku, Baidu, Dragon TV's website, outdoor media and 655 below-the-line sampling activities in Shanghai, Beijing, Tianjin, Shenyang, Dalian, Harbin, Qingdao, Zhengzhou, Nanjing, Chongqing, Chengdu, Guangzhou, Wuhan, Shenzhen and Xi’an. Around than 3,200,000 free Mizone bottles were distributed in these 'Cube tours'. Digital was also given full play via mobile apps and real-time messaging coinciding with TV broadcasts. Outdoor presence was interspersed across 20 LED screens in eight cities, 600 bus shelters and bus bodies, and 20,000 Touch Media touchscreens in taxis.

From 23 May to 22 July, 11 episodes of the "Mizone Dream Cube" show went live throughout the country's evening primetime slot (21：15-22：45) on Shanghai Dragon Television, with the show host repeatedly mentioning the brand keywords "ready for life" to participants.

Results

• In nationwide TV ratings, the show ranked fourth for its time slot among all satellite televison programs, according to CSM, local TV data provider. Media value ROI came up to 459 per cent.

• Online video viewership clocked 10.5 million.

• 1.5 million mobile apps were downloaded, according to OMD

• More than 250,000 consumers took part in BTL activities across 280,000 retail stores

• Sales of Mizone products from May to August increased by more than 70 per cent versus the same period last year

• Brand preference increased 10 per cent, according to Shanghai Xiangtian Market Research Company.