Tag: Astro

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia – The celebration of Hari Raya in Malaysia has concluded, marking the end of the holy month of Ramadan. And with such festivities, there is always a rise of ad films centred around the values and teachings of the Raya festivities.

In line with this, YouTube in Malaysia has round up the top 10 Raya ads released by local and international brands in the country.  Presented in alphabetical order, the list is based on a mix of relatable festive situations that touched the hearts and funny bones of viewers, collaborations with well-loved local personalities, and nostalgia for the good ol’ days, while continuing to explore the creative formats of past campaigns.

  1. Astro Malaysia – Senandung Hari Raya Untukmu – Dato’ Sri Siti Nurhaliza & Aliff Aziz 

Through an original track sung by Malaysian singer Siti Nurhaliza and local-based Singaporean artist Aliff Aziz, this campaign from the Malaysian satellite TV provider aims to communicate the values of the Raya season, from keeping in touch with loved ones or supporting local businesses for any Raya needs.

  1. Celcom Malaysia – Iklan Hari Raya Celcom 2022 – Syukur 1 Syawal

Duit raya or tokens of money given during Raya are great and all: but have we actually thought about where we ought to spend them? In this heart-warming campaign by this local telco provider, we see a kid named Danish going around houses with his friends to collect duit raya. Among those kids is Aishah, who later on we learn that she gives all of her duit raya to his ailing father. Touched by this scene, Danish thinks of an act of kindness to Aishah’s father.

  1. HongLeong Bank Malaysia – HLB RAYA 2022 – Lebaran Penuh Kesyukuran

This fun and quirky campaign by banking institution HongLeong Bank in Malaysia centres around the festive days despite instances being not the most ‘perfect’ celebration. In spite of obstacles along the way, like the camera falling over a swamp while taking a family picture or meals getting delayed, there is still a glimmer of hope and genuine happiness around family members to be together as always.

  1. Julie’s Biscuits – Raya 2022 | Ini Iklan Raya baru, tau? [Full] | Julie’s Biscuits

Conceptualised by independent agency GOVT Singapore, this hilarious yet eye-opening campaign by the local biscuit brand invites Malaysians to explore traditional definitions of stereotypical roles and see how antiquated expectations no longer hold in today’s day and age.

  1. PETRONAS – PETRONAS Raya 2022 ‘366’: Hari Ke-123 | Full Film

“Find peace within that disappointment”: It is within one of these lines within the ad that sum up the message of the campaign. This Raya-centric campaign is part of Petronas’ ongoing original series called ‘366’, aimed at tackling stories of fortitude, resilience and togetherness among Malaysians during these difficult times. Said campaign is conceptualised under Ensemble Worldwide of IPG Mediabrands.

  1. Saji Malaysia Official – Iklan Raya SAJI 2022 | Raya Dulu – Dulu

This fun campaign by local cooking oil brand Saji focuses on cherishing the Raya festivities, even if it feels like it will never be the same as last year. In this film, we follow a male character cherishing past Raya celebrations, while being mindful to always remember such important moments from past Raya festivities into the future.

  1. Samsung Malaysia – Raya 2022 | Rezeki Memori

Centred around the theme of fun and nostalgic memories, this film by tech company Samsung focuses on a story of Adik and his father cherishing some great memories–which is actually an emotional representation of missing sharing those moments a long time ago. The film, shot on a Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra phone, invites viewers to cherish time with their parents, one of the values being focused during the Raya festivities.

  1. Spritzer Group – Raya 2022 | Iklan Raya Paling Berseri

On a more hilarious route, this Raya ad by Spritzer focuses on doing the festivities, alongside with your full-out relatives, in this ad signifying Auntie Vivi. Despite the stereotypical nature of the ad, it teaches viewers to just remain calm and enjoy the festivities.

  1. Taylor’s University – Sadaqah | Hari Raya 2022

If there is one saying to embody this ad from Malaysia’s Taylor’s University, it’s the adage of “If you give a man a fish, you feed him for a day. If you teach a man to fish, you feed him for a lifetime.” The ad follows the story of a beggar named Amin, who asks one day for free food from a food stall owned by Kak Zaiton. Despite the ad’s initial impression of Zaiton being angry always, we see a different side of her story, as being compassionate towards the poor. In all, Zaiton’s character teaches viewers of not just getting something but rather having the opportunity to learn and grow as a person.

  1. Tenaga Nasional Berhad – TNB Raya 2022 – Raya Macam Cara

The perfect ad to close this entry, this ad from Malaysia’s multinational electricity company focuses on the diversity of emotions–and antics–during the Raya festivities. After a long time where Raya meetups have been hampered during the pandemic, said ad communicates the long-yearning of families to meet up during these festive times.

Said ad list showcases the most engaging ads that people watched during this period, and are determined in no particular order by an algorithm that factors in watch time, organic views, paid views, and audience retention. This list was pulled on 5 May, 2022 and captures data from 3 April to 3 May 2022 inclusive.

Malaysia — It is the time of the year again with a heightened interest for IklanRaya and brands and agencies are tinkering to create entertaining videos to capture the attention of audiences. Due to this, Astro embarked on a grand plan to launch a Hari Raya movie instead.

The movie was done in collaboration with Naga DDB Tribal and is entitled ‘Tujuh Hari Di Bawah Matahari’. Directed by acclaimed film director Razaisyam Rashid, the film will be premiering nationwide exclusively on Astro GO on the evening of Hari Raya at 8.30 pm and then on the 3rd day of Raya at 8 pm on Astro RIA, PRIMA, WARNA, CITRA, CERIA. The film will be released on the 6th of May on YouTube as well.

Having a runtime of 21 minutes, the movie is breaking away from the usual formula of Raya TVCs. The movie chronicles the Ramadan journey of the protagonist through hardships; a mirror to the production of the movie which was fraught with hurdles due to the limitations of the COVID-19 pandemic. But, like a famous adage once says; most things that are worth doing are hardly ever achieved easily. The arduous journey depicted in ‘Tujuh Hari Di Bawah Matahari’ is a story of perseverance, a celebration of human will, and coming of age.

Erman Basiron, creative group head of Naga DDB Tribal, points out that a story that communicates good values is a story worth telling and that has always been the guiding principle when we work on our festive communication for Astro and any other clients for that matter.

“These days, it is common for the younger generation to gauge success simply through material success and seek validation of their self-worth from peers and society via social media. Caught up in material-world pursuits, it is all too easy to forget the true spirit of Ramadan and Hari Raya,” Basiron said.

Shiraz Faruqi, creative director of Naga DDB Tribal, commented, “This coming-of-age road trip story of a young guy who Balik kampung by cycling 500km with a cat while fasting during Ramadan and learns that “the most important things in life are not things” presents a rich storytelling opportunity that deserves more screen time on a much bigger platform. It simply makes sense for Astro, as the premier Malaysian entertainment content provider, to entertain its audience with a Hari Raya film.”

According to Tammy Toh, director of group marketing and communications of Astro, “Astro has a tradition of harnessing its multiple platforms to open minds for a brighter future. This mission to do good and contribute to the social engineering of the country is an ongoing effort. And the approach is to entertain, enlighten and empower.

Toh adds, “While insightfully tapping into the zeitgeist to entertain our audience, Astro also enlightens and empowers viewers with nuggets of wisdom to shed light on issues and remedy ignorance that currently affect society at large.”

According to an intelligence website platform, there was a marked increase in consumption of content during the period of Ramadan-Raya from April to May 2021. Users also tend to spend longer durations on those sites during each visit. Therefore, it made for a strong case to create content rather than a commercial for the benefit of Astro’s brand equity and business objectives.

Another driving factor behind the decision to ‘upsize’ a Raya TV commercial to a short movie is to appeal to a younger audience. Youth-oriented content is well received on Astro and this gave Naga DDB Tribal the confidence that a coming-of-age story would strike a chord and resonate well with a younger audience. So, instead of running the usual Raya greetings on TV and social media, this year those spots will be filled with trailers to promote the movie.

Malaysia — TV and radio operator Astro in Malaysia, in collaboration with advertising agency Naga DDB Tribal, has launched a festive campaign ahead of the Chinese New Year to raise awareness on the challenges of local Chinese performing artists amidst the pandemic.

Entitled ‘A Tiger’s Heart’, the film centres around the theme of finding hope and positivity amidst trying times. The film also featured one of the top Malaysian lion dance troupes to create a more realistic representation of the hardships performers endure during a time when the performing industry is struggling. The story starts with a lion dance troupe losing its heart during the pandemic before ultimately finding its footing through the sheer tenacity of one character.

Benedict Tan, Naga DDB tribal’s associate creative director, commented, “Society needs artists, just as it needs doctors, engineers, scientists, professionals, workers, fathers and mothers. We as a society owe it to these gifted and talented artistic individuals, as without the influence of performing arts and culture, one can only imagine what our world will be. And that became the inspiration and reason behind this film.”

Astro started the year with the UHuu Be Strong! campaign. Through the campaign, Astro assisted the local Chinese performing arts community with various initiatives. Aside from the film, Astro has also created a documentary entitled ‘Performers on AEC’, underscoring the journey of grit world-renowned Malaysian performers experienced. The agency also donated RM10,000 to support performing art associations.

Gavin Teoh, business director for Naga DDB Tribal, commented on the continuous support the agency is giving to Malaysian communities, saying that they will continue to use their platforms to open the minds of Malaysians — to raise awareness on cultural issues, challenge societal expectations and champion the right causes for the nation and its people.

Hong Kong – Premier League, one of the well-known football leagues globally, has rolled out its second phase of anti-piracy campaign across Asia, specifically to the markets of Hong Kong and Malaysia. Said campaign is centered around the dangers that illegal football streams pose to fans.

Done in partnership with broadcast partners Astro and PCCW, the campaign notes the perils of patronizing illegal football streams which include data theft to malicious malware, as well as emphasizing the poor viewing experience through broken links and delays.

Said campaign will feature images of fan favorites such as Manchester United’s Marcus Rashford, Leicester City’s Jamie Vardy, Tottenham Hotspur’s Son Heung-min and Liverpool manager Jürgen Klopp. In addition, the campaign will be rolled out across digital platforms in Hong Kong and Malaysia.

Speaking about the campaign, Kevin Plumb, director of legal services at Premier League, said, “This campaign is an important part of our education to fans. We will continue working with our broadcast partners to fight piracy and disrupt illegal Premier League streams. However, we want to ensure supporters really understand that piracy is not only illegal but also brings with it many risks.”

He added, “Illegal Premier League streaming also means missing out on watching high-definition games in real-time with expert commentary and insights from players and managers. We want fans to enjoy the best Premier League viewing experience possible via official broadcast channels, not via broken and delayed illegal sources which also bring with them a great risk of malicious malware and ransomware.”

The Premier League is committed to tackling piracy and continues to work closely with its official broadcast partners in the region to educate consumers on the dangers they face when watching illegal football streams.

Furthermore, across the Southeast Asia region, the Premier League has also been targeting those responsible for operating illegal football streams and bringing them to justice through the courts.

We know that the consumer is ever-changing but the fluidity of their behavior has taken an entirely different meaning this pandemic – with unprecedented changes that unfolded such as the constraint on physical interactions and the economic plunge of markets, this completely overhauled how brands and businesses engaged with their target consumers. 

Last September 21, MARKETECH APAC, in partnership with CleverTap, gathered marketing leaders from all over the APAC region representing different industries, for the roundtable “Business Growth Levers from Acquisition to Retention” to discuss how the pandemic has shaken brands’ current playbook on consumer acquisition and retention strategies. 

Growth and marketing heads from the edtech, grocery, TV, airline, fitness, fintech, fast food, and publication sectors each shared their unique challenges and how their teams adapted to emerging brand new cohorts, shifting priorities among consumers, with new desires and motivations at the front. 

Watch live the highlights of the roundtable and hear straight from APAC’s marketing heads the notable changes this pandemic on consumer acquisition and retention.

The rise of new consumer segments amid the pandemic

The areas of educational platform, publication, and fitness witnessed the arrival of new consumer personas borne out of the heightened digital lifestyle. 

Marisha Lakhiani, CMO of Mindvalley, a learning platform for self-help and entrepreneurship, shared that during the period, the platform suddenly attracted younger users, a group it didn’t predominantly draw in before. 

Meanwhile, for global fitness brand Les Mills International, it found that its main fitness consumer now favors a split between in-gym and home digital workouts.

“The consumer’s new normal is 60:40 in terms of live and digital fitness; so if they’re doing 5 workouts in a week, 3 of them they want to do it in a club, in a live environment, and 2 they want to do as a digital workout,” shared Anna Henwood, CMO of Les Mills International. 

As for publications, Philippines’ Summit Media saw these changes most evidently on how consumers shifted their patterns in finding and consuming content. Specifically for its parenting brand, Smart Parenting, Facebook used to be its biggest acquisition channel, but over the current period, the channel has not been giving the volatility that’s expected, according to its Growth Lead Iza Santos-Cuyos.

During the roundtable, David Lim, the vice president for marketing of grocery platform HappyFresh, pointed out that whatever strategies that may have served marketing teams pre-pandemic can now be officially considered bygones.

“As a marketer, whatever we have learned in textbooks, on websites, [and] on webinars can be forgotten in the past 18 months…because if you just look at acquisition, everything has changed,” said Lim. 

Lim adds, “I think when it comes to the topic of acquisition, everything has to be extremely localized. We have to look at each market on its own, we have to look at each cohort on its own, and then link it back to how they retain, how they come back month after month in a very granular [manner], much more granular than before.” 

For acquiring consumers, improving SEO and search strategies have been the common thread, while forging strategic partnerships showed itself to be the redeeming factor among marketing teams to both acquire and retain consumers in the current market climate. At the roundtable, marketing leaders also emphasized the importance of first-party data.

For Mindvalley and Summit Media, it has been the same go-to response – focusing and investing more in search and SEO. 

“We identified the customers that we are actually retaining and try to acquire them, so like micro-acquiring a particular audience,” said Mindvalley’s Marisha Lakhiani. 

Summit Media’s Iza Santos-Cuyos shared that as they bolster their search strategies, the publication realized that it is in fact attracting a different set of cohorts on search versus those coming from Facebook, bringing them to conclude that they cannot now discount Facebook altogether while focusing on search.

“What we learned from doing that is to devise a separate strategy for audiences acquired on Facebook versus those acquired on search,” said Santos-Cuyos. 

Brands forming strategic partnerships to cushion drastic market changes

The fast-food industry took one of the biggest hits during the pandemic, with the phased-out in-person interactions blowing the footfall for dine-in. 

In the roundtable, KFC Malaysia’s CMO May Ling Chan shared that partnering with food delivery platforms acted as a safety net, where within the e-commerce scene, the QSR sector has not been the fastest in adoption. 

“I think what happened during the pandemic was [the] growth of food aggregators. For us, I think that’s the biggest part of acquisition that we see,” said Chan. 

Online food delivery has seen an unprecedented rise in adoption by both brands and consumers. According to a report by Statista, in Asia, revenue in the online food delivery segment has been projected to reach US$223,372m this year. 

Singapore’s supermarket chain NTUC FairPrice echoes the same gameplan, where its convenience store Cheers inked a tie-up with top delivery platforms GrabFood and foodpanda in order to answer to the surge in need for on-demand and fast delivery of food products. 

Vivek Kumar, NTUC FairPrice Group’s director for strategic marketing & omnichannel monetization, cited ‘Supper moments’ which Cheers aimed to create through the partnership, where consumers can not only see product offerings in a snap but to “go ahead” and complete their transaction in real-time.

“Supper moments on food delivery platforms is quite a unique opportunity. [When] restaurants are closed and you [still] want your beer and your nachos and your croissants, and stuff like that, this is the place to go to.” Kumar said.

He adds, “We can’t wait for the customers to come to us. We can create the right occasion [as long as] we understand the customer’s needs. We must give them very friction-free shopping experiences where they can complete their mission – you can’t leave it midway.”

The fast-changing consumer patterns pressing the importance of first-party data

Global cross-border payments platform OFX was also one of the brands that participated in the roundtable and its Global Head of Digital Acquisition Shad Haehae shared that as the pandemic pushed the stronger need for brands to know their customers a lot more, this made the platform re-evaluate the quality of data it obtains.

“We’re a money business, and people send money for particular reasons, so those reasons have changed,” said Haehae. 

OFX previously relied on third-party data for insights, but Haehae shares that as a business, OFX figured that it needed to be smarter on this front.

“We adopted new partnerships, new types of technologies [not just] from [a] martech [and] adtech perspective, even from a data perspective. We’ve done a lot of consolidation on platforms and data.” 

The same is the case for TV and radio operator giant, Astro, in Malaysia. 

“So it’s a balance between providing value to the customers to [keep] them from churning [and] aggregating our first-party data with social data, and with data that we have in the network to go after customers a lot more aggressively than we have in the past,” said Norsiah Juriani Johari, Astro’s vice president of marketing. 

For Les Mills International, they eventually leveraged first-party data which it successfully included in its marketing strategy because of the direct-to-consumer journey it now has via its own fitness app. Predominantly, its consumer was a gym member which Henwood admits the brand had no prior visible data of as well as on how its products looked like. 

With digital fitness now ingrained in people’s exercise routines, Henwood shared that content has become its differentiator, which is what makes “people stay.”

“So how we film our content [in] the lockdown, how we do that more and more so it’s really engaging with the customer, and how we [connect with] different personalities through [our] content – that’s been a big part of our retention strategy,” Henwood shares. 

For Cebu Pacific Air, meanwhile, one of the Philippines’ leading airlines, answering to pandemic-induced shifts meant working inward and letting the team adapt to new ways of implementing marketing strategies. 

Alongside relying on new consumer segments during this period, Michelle De Guzman, the airline’s marketing director, said, “Even the ways of working that we have as a marketing team, it has changed as well when it comes to user acquisition and retention.”

She shares, “We have also developed agile marketing sprints – and that was not something that was done before, but [has become] very important on what we do now.” 

Consumer acquisition & retention in 2022 and beyond

While overcoming each of the hurdles in their industries, marketing leaders agree that staying on top of the game is all about being continuously aligned to the shifts – from the minute to the massive transitions – in consumer and market behavior. 

HappyFresh’s David Lim believes that we cannot apply the same methods of acquisition anymore, and in 2022, one of the beliefs and assumptions that their team has is things would not be the same as pre-covid.

“Every country has [its] own announcement, every country has [its] own waves of covid with different government announcements. I think when it comes to the topic of acquisition, everything has to be extremely localized,” said Lim. 

Building trust among consumers also remains a vital factor in the consumer engagement journey, says Katherine Cheung, CMO of edtech Snapask. 

“One key factor that we have in Snapask on user retention and how to retain customers to our platform is of course by building trust. We have to bear in mind that since the pandemic, people have so much more free time, as most of the regions are still experiencing lockdown and they are not allowed to go out from time to time. We have to bear in mind that users have so much more time to invest in your product,” Cheung said.

FairPrice’s Vivek Kumar’s advice to leaders, “As a marketing leader, we need to create that vision and then keep people involved in the journey, so that becomes their objective and their mission and not just [acting according to] marketing teams’ wishlist – the moment that silo happens, we have lost the battle.”

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia – Multimedia broadcasting Astro has tapped customer relationship management (CRM) company Evergent, to activate monetization for its newest streaming service sooka, launched last June this year.

Through the partnership, Astro will use Evergent’s customer management and monetization tools to support registration and subscription management for sooka. Offering both free ad-supported content and subscription services, sooka unites live international sports programming with popular Malaysian dramas and entertainment programs.

For Euan Smith, chief executive officer of TV and group chief operations officer at Astro, the company’s mission is to provide Malaysians with entertaining and informative content, reaching as many customers as possible through the most popular platforms and devices.

“Through our partnership with Evergent, we are now able to offer multiple pricing options for our new sooka streaming platform while also retaining the ability to unlock new business opportunities as we scale the service. As a result, our customers can choose the pricing model and payment methods that best match their needs, allowing Malaysians to enjoy premium content and live sports anytime, anywhere,” Smith said.

Meanwhile, Vijay Sajja, founder and CEO of Evergent, notes that Astro’s new flexible monetization options, powered by Evergent’s technology, will now make premium content more accessible to millions of Malaysians.

“Through Evergent’s global partnerships, we are able to work together with the most innovative media and entertainment companies in each country or region. Astro is the market leader for Malaysian entertainment and a leader in Southeast Asia, and we are proud to help them further grow their business through the launch of sooka,” Sajja stated.

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia – Small businesses have been hit hard during the pandemic, which resulted in setbacks and shutdowns. With this, Astro, the satellite television provider in Malaysia, has launched a new campaign called ‘Time to Evolve’, which aims to help SMEs identify their weaknesses and turn their operations around and get back up from the recent downturn. 

‘Time to Evolve’ campaign, which has the tagline ‘Watch, Learn and Evolve’,is part of its efforts in supporting the affected enterprises. It features programs with expert guests from various industries who will share professional insights.

The new campaign includes Astro’s AEC signature ‘Business Talk’, which is returning for the 4th season. This latest installment of the series will see its host Gan Jiang Han and his new partner, renowned financial and current affairs DJ Xiao Ma, hosting together with a new lineup of experts from various industries, helping the SMEs to discover new business opportunities.

The talk show, which will premiere on 16 August 2021 at 9:30 pm MYT on Astro AEC (HD CH306) and Astro GO, will be tackling different challenging business topics, from navigating economic uncertainty to seizing opportunities amid adversity. It will also be providing all-around solutions to SMEs, allowing the viewers to submit questions related to the topic of the show via QR code scan. The experts will then answer the relevant questions via Facebook Live on Hotspot FB page the day after the show’s premiere.

Furthermore, the campaign includes a series of exciting business programs and activities for SMEs, including ‘Astro Equipped to Evolve Webinar’, a virtual seminar by experts in various aspects to support SMEs and furnish them with the right tools, techniques, and knowledge in adapting to the uncertain economic climate. Under the ecosystem, there will also be free online courses catering to different business sectors.

Siah Ping Wong, Astro’s vice president for Chinese customer business, said that with the pandemic going on for more than a year and the nation undergoing a prolonged lockdown, transformation is inevitable especially for the SMEs. 

“We hope to be able to help these enterprises in observing, learning, and evolving from the crisis in order to revive their businesses,” said Wong.

The campaign is also launching Astro’s brand new series ‘Small Business Big Ideas’, which provides microentrepreneurs with more knowledge, from the fundamental skills and information such as how to register for their businesses to the allocation of shares and more. And lastly, viewers can expect to see the return of ‘SME Great Helper 2.0’, a reality show showcasing mentors who are ready to give advice and help SMEs turn their businesses around.

Astro said that they have always been committed to assisting SMEs with their previous initiatives, and they were able to equip business owners with free advertising packages to gain optimal exposure for business growth.