Issue 10

Creative procrastination in action

Show dogs dressed in sporting apparel; 200 snails with LED lights strapped to their backs; a man wearing a suit made from bubble wrap; what on earth do these things have to do with using BPAY?

At BPAY, we believe wasting time in awesome ways should be celebrated. That's why we created The World's Biggest Most Awesome Waste of Time competition. The idea behind the current youth campaign is intended to resonate with our target audience (18-25 year olds): when you have bills to pay, you can pay them online quickly, easily and securely with BPAY, leaving university-aged students plenty of time to do other, much more awesome things. Perhaps surprising news to some, research has suggested that many students line up to make payments at the post office. Hence the launch of the Biggest Most Awesome Waste of Time Competition, which kicked off during University O-Week 2010. This is completely new territory for BPAY and we had a ball!

This campaign is very different from any other marketing activity BPAY have undertaken in the past, primarily because it is the first time we are speaking to a young audience, as they are not traditional users of BPAY. The objective is to ensure that BPAY is on the radar of the next generation of bill payers so that BPAY becomes the first choice for bill payments in the future.

Three original videos were created to inspire the target audience and exemplify time wasting in the most awesome ways:

• CRATES - stop motion photography involving milk crates, a man and eventually an awesome sea monster;
• BUBBLE-WRAP MAN - follow Bubble Wrap Man on his mission to pop all of his bubbles; and
• SNAILS - watch 200 snails with LED lights strapped to their backs in fast forward.

Once at the microsite, www.awesometimewasting.com.au, BPAY encouraged the target audience to submit their most awesome time wasting idea to be in the running to win a MacBook Pro and have their awesome time wasting idea formed into a professionally produced video. The runner up prize is a 32GB iPod Touch. There has been an incredibly positive response with over 670 entries having been submitted. These have been narrowed down to 5 entries, which have now been placed on the microsite to be voted on.

As part of the campaign, BPAY sent roaming bubble-wrapped teams of students to the largest University Campuses in Sydney and Melbourne and awarded students who exemplified awesome time wasting with spot prizes. Not only did it make students curious and laugh, it engaged them with the competition and led them to visit the website and enter their ideas. We received an incredibly positive response and a 'that's a pretty cool idea' from most of the students on campus.

Results of the campaign

The campaign achieved results far beyond our targets or expectations. The total number of visits to date (as per beginning of May) to the www.awesometimewasting.com.au website are 64,421 visitors, with absolute unique site visits at an impressive 56,309 visitors. The total number of entries to the competition was a whopping 677!

The amount of Australian views recorded on YouTube of the videos to date are:

• Snail Art - 23,417
• Bubble Wrap Man - 11,404
• Milk Crate Sea Monster - 16,676

And interestingly, the BPAY youth campaign also attracted international attention with over 100,000 international views of the videos. Pretty awesome!