Listerine Malaysia freshens up CNY customs with Jenn Chia

Listerine Malaysia has launched a new campaign working with well-known social media content creator Jenn Chia (soimjenn) this Chinese New Year season. The agency behind the campaign, Mediabrands Content Studio (MBCS), worked with the client to unveil the #SwishAwaySuay campaign aims to swish away bad luck – ‘suay’ which means bad lunch in the Hokkien dialect.

Tracy Foo, senior brand manager of Listerine said the team was looking to innovate the brand and the agency presented a trendy idea that intersects well with the brand and cultural insights.

Andy Ng, head of performance content and social for MBCS said Chia was an obvious choice for an influencer as she is fun and relatable across all ages. #SwishAwaySuay kickstarted with a video that went viral on social media, garnering up to 20,000 likes in 12 hours on her Instagram account @soimjenn, according to the agency.

The piece depicts Chia in her famous Auntie Siow character, attempting to take a family portrait, including family members Ah Ma, Ah Suk, Jennston, Michelle and Jenn. This is the first such video or branded content that brings together all Chia’s characters at the same time, while introducing new ones.

“Taking a family portrait is quite an integral part of CNY tradition, and if you’ve experienced it, the process of getting everyone to sit together for a perfect photo can be quite a feat. Filming all the characters in one screen also proved to be challenging with the mirrors and green screen, but it all came together to capture the perfect Auntie Siow CNY family portrait,” said Ng.

Ng added that every year, the agency challenges ourselves to keep things fresh and engaging for Listerine. Rather than going the traditional route, this year it looked to present out of the box entertainment to connect with our young consumers.

Chia added, “It has been such a gratifying experience working with the MBCS team to conceptualise something unique and different. I love how open Listerine is to push boundaries! Listerine was confident in building on the storytelling and concept enough to allow the product to be revealed during the plot twist, rather than in the first 5 seconds. I am so happy to create and be a part of this collaboration with Listerine and MBCS.”

The campaign launched on 3 January and will run through CNY.