Ajax: Ajax - Clean Tiles

Credits & Description:

Title: Ajax - Clean Tiles
Agency: Anr Bbdo
Brand: Ajax
Country: Sweden
Entrant Company: Anr Bbdo, Stockholm
Advertising Agency: Anr Bbdo, Stockholm
Production Company: Anr Bbdo, Stockholm
Account Director: Magnus Norman (Anr Bbdo)
Senior Account Manager: Giustina Guariglia (Anr Bbdo)
Account Director: Maria Fager (Anr Bbdo)
Art Director: Gisela Andersson (Anr Bbdo)
Campaign Description:
AJAX has always been marketed with the promise of clean, glistening white tiles in Sweden. In March 2017, Stockholm replaced the old billboards in the subway, and behind them, 60 years of dirty tiles were revealed. This was the perfect opportunity to prove AJAX’s benefit. In the middle of the night, we used the dirty tiles as our canvas to create a powerful message and prove that AJAX really makes dirty tiles white, with a real life demo.
Synopsis:
In Sweden AJAX is widely known as a surface cleaning detergent. Being a small and mature market, the majority of all advertising investments are made either instore or in mass media, with generic trans created and dubbed international work. With a tiny budget (6000€), we were tasked to do something fun that stands out to as many Stockholmers as possible, to bring the brand promise “powerful cleaning” to life in the real world.Our main objective was to demonstrate the product and increase the understanding of the brand promise. It was also important to achieve a high ad liking – we wanted to make our audience smile.
Strategy:
Given our very limited budget, we needed to create something spectacular. The phrase “Engineered for Instagram” served as our guiding light. We also knew that we not only needed to talk about AJAX’s capability to create white tiles – we needed to show how AJAX works in real life. The place for our product demo was one of Stockholm’s busiest subway stations.What was extra crucial was also to have the billboard owners convinced that is was a great idea to use and pinpoint the dirty walls in the subway – a forgotten space that they normally are not very proud of.
Outcome:
During the 11 days that our “ad” was up, we managed to reach over
5 million people with a single OOH. Due to strategic media planning and flawless execution we managed to achieve a record low CPM cost of only 0,42 EUR (2 524 676 / 6000 EUR).And what’s extraordinary is that the ad performed the highest ad liking for a subway OOH ever in Sweden (90% vs the previous record of 83%). According to a survey made, everyone who had seen the ad in the subway station also succeeded to point out the brand promise and message for the campaign. Sales reps for Colgate-Palmolive in Sweden now use the documented results in their sales presentations.
Relevancy:
This execution is a perfect example of how to really use the strength of a specific and tailored media space with the right message at the right time and context. By using our powerful product to actually create the media (billboard) we bring the brand to life.
Execution:
As soon as we had the billboard owners on board, we had to move quickly as they wanted to clean up the subway and put up the new billboards as soon as possible. Due to our budget, we only had one three-piece series space to work with and therefore only one chance (and only three hours when the train traffic shut down for the night) to do it right. The craft was everything – if we had “cleaned up” the dirt in the wrong way, we would’ve hurt the brand instead of building it. One slip and the piece would be destroyed. But with great art direction and craft and with a great detergent product, we managed to clean the billboards to perfection. Using traditional cleaning rhetoric, but in a new context – not talking about it in an ad, but by proving it.