Red Bull: THE SUPER BADMAN

Credits & Description:

Category: Consumer Goods, including FMCG and Household Products

Advertiser: RED BULL

Product/Service: ENERGY DRINK

Agency: OGILVY BEIJING

Agency: H-LINE OGILVY COMMUNICATIONS

Chief Creative Officer: Graham Fink (Ogilvy Beijing)

Executive Creative Director: Bill Chan (Ogilvy Beijing)

Creative Director: Neo Zhou (Ogilvy Beijing)

Copywriter: Bill Chan (Ogilvy Beijing)

Copywriter: Ricky Zhang (Ogilvy Beijing)

Art Director: Neo Zhou (Ogilvy Beijing)

Art Director: Guanlu Zhao (Ogilvy Beijing)

Art Director: Chenghao Xie (Ogilvy Beijing)

Art Director: Fuyu Yang (Ogilvy Beijing)

Photographer: Xiaohang Liu (Ogilvy Beijing)

Illustrator: Dixun Sun (Jiaye Yinghua)

Production House: Camis Image

Director: Peng Xia

Producer: Feng Gao (Camis Image)

Director Of Photography: Peng Chen (Camis Image)

Editor: Yun Lu (Camis Image)

Designer: Dixun Sun (Jiaye Yinghua)

Account: Brenda Jin (Ogilvy Beijing)

Account: Emma Niu (Ogilvy Beijing)

Account: Yue Li (Ogilvy Beijing)

Media placement: Digital PR - Sina Weibo, Youku.com - 12 - 23 March 2012



Summary of the Campaign

- Badminton is very popular in China and the Chinese national badminton team is the brand ambassador of Red Bull. We were required to use badminton to help build up a drinking habit while playing badminton.

- We found badminton fans love practising and competing with each other. They would talk about masters in the group and look forward to competing with them. So we finally came up with an idea of creating a mysterious badminton master.

- We created 'the Super Badman' means 'super badminton man', who went to some big badminton stadiums to compete with the best players there. People in the stadiums were curious about his special look and skills. Some even recorded the scenes with their cell phones and shared them with their friends on the internet. Soon the Super Badman became a hot topic among badminton fans.

- Then he used his Sina\Tencent Weibo accounts to communicate with his fans. The fans retweeted the contents and made him more famous.

- The result was great and more badminton fans took Red Bull as their first beverage choice while they were playing badminton.



The Situation

- Badminton is popular in China. There are about 200m badminton fans all around China and they create a huge potential market for every brand.

- Red Bull China has signed the Chinese national badminton team as its brand ambassador and has launched a series of badminton campaigns since 2010.

- Red Bull products have been distributed into big badminton stadiums in the primary cities in China. The problem is that badminton fans do not drink Red Bull while they’re playing badminton or they won’t take it as the first beverage choice.



The Goal

Our goal is to build up a playing-badminton drinking occasion in a young and cool way. We need to tell badminton fans to think about and drink Red Bull while they’re playing badminton. Eventually they will form a drinking habit.



The Strategy

- We find that badminton fans love practising together and gradually they become a small group or a club which will compete with each other quite often.

- Badminton masters in the group or club usually become the centre. Ordinary fans will imitate their gesture and skills in order to get improvement. They also look forward to competing with the masters.

- We finally came up with an idea of creating a mysterious badminton master, who would go to some big badminton stadiums to compete with ordinary badminton fans. We wanted to start a discussion between badminton fans.



Execution

- We found an inconspicuous-looking guy with super-high badminton skills. We made him put on an opera facial mask and named him 'the Super Badman', which means 'the super badminton man'.

- He went to some big badminton stadiums to compete with ordinary badminton fans. With his high skills and series of victories, he became the centre of the stadiums. Many people were curious and used mobile phones to record him. The fans shared the pictures and videos on the internet and more people paid attention to him. The Super Badman soon became a popular topic between fans in just a few days.

- Then the Super Badman registered Sina\Tencent Weibo accounts to communicate with his fans. The fans retweeted the contents and made him more famous.

- We hid Red Bull in the contents and made the fans realise that Red Bull is the energy source of the badminton warrior.



Documented Results

His videos and pictures were posted in the internet, and within just 2 weeks there were 50,628 hits and 2,508 forwards. Naturally, more and more badminton fans related Red Bull to Super Badman and they tend to drink more Red Bull while playing. He also attracts more people to Red Bull’s amateur badminton games.



It is worth mentioning that the cost of the entire campaign was 12,000 RMB.