Oral-b: DID YOU KNOW?

Credits & Description:

Category: Fast Moving Consumer Goods

Advertiser: PROCTER & GAMBLE

Product/Service: ORAL B TOOTHBRUSH

Date of First Appearance: Jul 1 2009 12:00AM

Entrant Company: MEDIACOM ISRAEL, Ramat Gan, ISRAEL

Chief Executive Officer: Gilad Kat (MediaCom Israel)

Communications Planning Supervisor: Inbar Suberi (MediaCom Israel)

Category Manager: Michal Heller (Procter & Gamble Israel)

Distribution: Nir Shaulski (Diplomat)

BTL Manager: Avital Fadida (Promarket)

Chief Executive Officer: Doron Tal (Saatchi & Saatchi Interactive)

PR: Ronit Stern (Stern Arieli)

Head of International Department: Comi Karmon (Geller Nessis Publicis)

Media placement: Instore Communication (Signs/jumpers) - 6 Different Executions - All Leading Supermarket And Pharma Retail Chains In Israel Nationwide (SuperPhar - July 2009

Media placement: Online Search - Travel/Health/Home Renovation And Oral Care Related Keywords - July 2009

Media placement: Landing Site - Http://www.oral-B.co.il/test/know1.html - July 2009

Media placement: Display Campaign - All Leading Websites - Ynet.co.il(News);Nana10.co.il;yad2.co.il;Tapuz Forums; Is - July 2009

Media placement: TV Campaign - All Leading TV Stations - Ch. 2, Ch. 10, Ch. 24. Ch. 9 - August 2009

Media placement: Earned PR - Leading Daily Newspapers, Weeklies And News Websites - August 2009



Results and Effectiveness

Sales were up 10% one month after the campaign (vs. pre-campaign).
Three months after the launch, the positive trend continues with sales growing +18% year-on-year.

Most importantly, Oral B gained market leadership from Colgate in the toothbrush category – major achievement. Colgate is an oral care mega-brand, active in several sub-categories, while Oral B is only active in the toothbrush category and its ad investment is about half of that of Colgate.

The provocative insights we revealed helped us to generate great PR coverage (estimated 40% of total investment), and even created demand from professionals to try the new brush.



Creative Execution

We used “point of sale” – but not “point of toothbrush sale”. Instead we implemented "anti-contextual" touchpoints away from the toothbrush aisle. We featured our "Did You Know" provocative jumpers at the POS of other categories where the anti-bacteria concept is already established – the toilet cleaner section ("[…]recommended distance between the toilet and the sink prevents microparticles reaching toothbrushes when flushing"), the medicine section ("[…] change toothbrush at the beginning and end of illness[…]"), etc.

This enabled us to talk to prospects in environments where the competition does not usually communicate - therefore receiving more "stand out" and attention. Out insight-based anti-contextual messages wittily directed shoppers back to the toothbrush aisle.

The same approach was carried out in the digital world where banners and search words appeared in anti-contextual environments.

Once the topic was established and the need raised, we ran a TVC which offered the full Oral B anti-bac story.



Insights, Strategy & the Idea

Launching the new Oral B anti-bacterial toothbrush, we realised that for Israeli consumers, bacteria issues were perceived as completely unrelated to the toothbrush category and therefore did not reflect an existing need for purchase. In addition, the brush category is considered low involvement where brand and variant choices are mostly made on impulse instore.

Our challenge was to communicate a message our audience didn’t want to hear about a category they didn’t care much about.

Following extensive research, we developed a set of provocative insights to raise the bacteria issue in the category, structured as "Did You Know?" trivia-like questions.

We shifted our focus to POS, but we faced some additional challenges - limited display space, products shelved only on pegs. We needed to find alternative methods to get noticed instore.

We couldn’t advertise in the “right” place, so we devised a strategy of advertising in exactly the “wrong” place.