Personal Care Success Stories

POD Communications teams up with Red Cherry Media to produce reality series for Revlon 24Seven.

POD Communications created a highly interactive and creative campaign to drive sales and brand awareness for Revlon 24Seven, a men’s deodorant and category differentiator in the market.
The big idea behind the campaign was to get people to understand what a 24Seven man was all about, while at the same time pushing the guys to learn new things and getting them to test their limits.

POD and Red Cherry Media worked together to create a dynamic mechanic where consumers would purchase product, enter the competition via an on-pack sticker, and then stand the chance to appear on a reality TV show! The series highlighted the different traits of being: BOLD, ENERGETIC, AMBITIOUS, CONFIDENT AND DYNAMIC (the traits of a Revlon 24Seven man) in separate episodes that concentrated on relevant tasks that were applicable to that value.

Red Cherry Media was approached by POD to produce, direct and manage the entire campaign that ranged from pre-promo spots, promo spots and a series of 6 ‘reality’ episodes. Red Cherry also negotiated and booked all the media airtime. It was an epic undertaking that took many exciting weeks of planning and preparation by all involved. After the 6 finalists were chosen, from thousands of entrants, the real fun began. The object of the show, in addition to finding the ultimate 24Seven Man was also about imparting skills and knowledge to both the contestants and the audience. They were taken on bungee jumps, taught advanced driving skills, learned how to start a company and how to cook.

For both POD and Red Cherry Media it was an exhilarating month packed with surprises, a crazy, hectic schedule and some spectacular filming. From Orlando Towers in Soweto, to the Kyalami Race Track, everyone pulled out all the stops to make this an exciting and watchable series. Revlon 24Seven Skillz has been showing on E-TV every Tuesday night and they plan to go even bigger and better next year.

Pod Communications came to Red Cherry Media to produce the Revlon 24 seven deodorant reality TV show.

Red Cherry produced a 30 second launch promo calling for consumers to enter in order to be chosen as the Revlon 24 seven man and win amazing prizes.

Consumers purchased any 24 seven product in-store and sms’ed the unique code on pack.

6 800 entries were received over the campaign period in just over 2 months, of which 6 men were selected to be part of the show.

Red Cherry produced 6 x 3 minute weekly shows which flighted on eTV every Tuesday at 18:27pm. One contestant was eliminated each week until we were left with the ultimate Revlon 24 seven man.

A viewers competition was included giving those at home the chance to win a share of the R250 000 worth of prizes. Red Cherry negotiated and booked the TV airtime for all media including promo’s and shows.

Red Cherry is the production house behind an exciting new show on ETV. The Shield Teens No Sweat Dance Challenge is a dance competition with a difference. Unlike many dance reality TV shows, this talent search is exploring street dance in South Africa, searching for Kwaito, Hip Hop, House and RnB dancers. Craig Bullock (SA Hip Hop Coach), Jade Rahme (Sa Hip Hop and Tap Champion) and Dineo Msimang (Placed fifteenth in the Hip Hop World Championships) are the judging panel who will travel the country auditioning SA’s hottest movers and shakers. Girls from the ages of 12 to 16 were invited to pre-register by sms’ing Shield Teens and the last four digits of any Shield Teens bar-code to 33570. A TV campaign was launched prior to the auditions and young hopefuls flocked to the regional auditions in Cape Town, Durban, Pretoria and Johannesburg. The top five in each region will gather in Johannesburg for an intense workshop with the three judges (along with some surprise celebrity guests) and every week girls will be eliminated in an in-studio battle.

Limelight (on behalf of Amka Products) approached Red Cherry Media to extend a promotion for Sof n’ Free (an Ethnic hair care brand) into an ATL format.   The concept devised by Limelight was known as the "Spoil Yourself" campaign.  Over a five month period, each month Sof n’ Free gave away a fun shopping spree to one lucky winner and 2 friends, each valued at R30 000.  To enter, consumers had to purchase any Sof n’ Free product, sms "Sof n Free" and a friends cell number & retain the till slip to qualify.   The campaign was supported with full page print ads as well as instore point of sale, consisting of Category banners, Information leaflets, Super Coupon units, Shelf defenders, Brand Blockers and Box Banner ads and free standing units, to increase stock presence in stores.

Phemelo & Siphokazi, the current brand ambassadors, anchored the campaign & acted as hosts to the lucky winners on their shopping sprees. Phemelo has had an association with Sof n’ Free for some time & was an additional draw for long standing Sof n’ Free consumers who wanted to meet her. Siphokazi, who has been working with Sof n’ Free for the past year, drew the younger consumers who couldn’t wait to meet her!   Red Cherry Media produced a 30" launch promo for TV which communicated the entry mechanisms of the campaign.  Thereafter, 5 X 2 minute shows were produced (1 show was flighted each month).  Each winner & their friends enjoyed a hair make over with Sof n’ Free products, ahead of the shopping spree. During the show, the winner was asked about her favourite Sof n’ free products & then viewers watched as 1 very excited Sof n’ Free winner and her friends went on a shopping spree with Phemelo & Siphokazi.

Red Cherry Media produced a number of maintenance promos throughout the period.  The 30" maintenance promos showed ‘snippets’ of the previous winners and also reminded viewers of how to enter.   The interactive airtime was also planned & booked by Red Cherry Media in accordance with Aka’s Media Manager.   An independent research company reported the following:   * A database of 32,000 Sof n’ Free users was created (14,000 of which were via the viral marketing element) * It is quite apparent that the Red Cherry application gave the competition a strong boost * Hourly SMS statistics reflect that the entries peaked between 17h00 and 18h00; this was due to the TV activity implemented by Red Cherry Media * Daily graphs reflect a consistent pattern of peaking on the days the TV ad was run with an over flow of high entries for the next few days, indicating a strong awareness was created from the TV ad. * The daily graph also reflects that the TV ad helped to increase brand awareness and interaction by consumers began to grow after the ad or show lightings.   This short format show took a sassy & fun look at women’s needs - specifically, hair care & the need to shop!   The show was designed to create ‘talkability’ about the Sof n’ Free brand as well as to give the campaign longevity and a wide audience reach. Most importantly the show increased sales!   Following the success of this campaign, AMKA products are doing various initiatives with Red Cherry Media for their other brands.

This brand had a big problem moving product i.e. sales. After a while of advertising (across different mediums), ALL advertising was stopped and only Red Cherry’s Interactive TV brands, namely ADS UP & WOT’Z UP TV carried on. Client had to “pull” the campaign after just 2 weeks, as all product was sold out. Client was ecstatic!

Red Cherry’s Interactive Radio Platform – SPOT ON has been used for each & every burst over the past 2 years. 99% of the total media budget goes to Red Cherry.

From never using TV before, this product had a burst across MNet/ DStv using Red Cherry’s ADS UP TV Platform.

Client said “… there was a strong sales volume uplift during and post campaign – we are very happy with the results…”

The last campaign they did incorporating ADS UP & WOT’Z UP TV was monitored and tracked by AD TRACK. The noting of the campaign had increased over 60% compared to previous “same” TV campaigns (budget/ reach levels/ etc) that had not included Red Cherry’s Interactive Platforms.

Campaign was “damage control” due to the confusion in the consumer market of the name change Ego to Axe. Various other deodorant manufacturers created commercials that contained elements similar to Axe’s new commercial and name which detracted from the main message of the Ego/ Axe commercial.
They booked 31 flightings over a 10 day period. They received a total of
20 338 calls. The question we posed was “What has Ego changed its name to?” This form of question serves to drive home the message of the commercial, minimising confusion of any sort. They also collected a database of caller’s answers instead of prompting them (i.e. the on-air question was open ended on the phone line, not Dial 1 for XXX dial 2 for XXX)
The telephone systems in this country do not supply correct/ incorrect information on the responses without charging the client an arm and a leg for it so client received all this information on a CD to listen to and make their own conclusions.
They also asked one open ended research question “What is the main message of this commercial” Once again we have not yet had the results of this but in the US this information would be transcribed and supplied.

We see this campaign as extremely successful. The call volumes were very high for the target market (LSM 8-10 Males) but the creative of the commercial is appealing to the target market (see Visuals on CD) which always contributes to the call volumes. We can deduce from the high call volumes that the reach was high (especially due to the fact that with a high income target market like this one, we also generate the passive response – i.e. the viewer who watches the commercial to see if they know the answer but doesn’t actually pick up the phone) So there is an unknown percentage of passive response.