#MobExAwards highlight: Atome bets on the unconventional and wins big

COVID-19 has severely affected the retail sector across Asia. Businesses have struggled to sustain operations amid falling sales and foot traffic in malls, while consumers have spent less because of falling incomes and job losses from the pandemic. 

Atome wanted to connect to its target audience who were stuck at home, but didn’t want to resort to the usual marketing tactics as it felt they were overused and wouldn’t help it stand out from the many other brands that were shifting towards digital. Atome decided to launch Get It Week, a week-long campaign, along with a 360-degree marketing strategy. 

It also used kittens as its brand ambassadors as opposed to the conventional influencers, and even produced a music video for the furry animals. The brand also utilised social media platforms to engage with consumers and create user-generated content.

Atome’s ability to explore beyond conventional marketing saw it stand out from the rest, and secured it a spot as a finalist for Best Direct to Consumer Campaign at MARKETING-INTERACTIVE’s MobEx Awards 2021. 

Challenge

Consumers today are faced with formulaic shopping campaigns based on monthly single day events, with the main messages focusing on encouraging consumers to spend, along with jingles, and the usual celebrity key opinion leaders (KOLs).

Such campaigns have led to predictability and consumer fatigue, especially among Atome’s target audience of Gen Z and the Millennials. Furthermore, the pandemic left Atome’s target markets restricted by lockdowns and travel bans, leaving them to turn to digital platforms for purchases. 

Atome wanted to create a shopping experience that empowered consumers to go beyond their basic and immediate needs, helped them to make smart shopping decisions, allowed them to exercise their creativity, and have access to exclusive deals across key categories that would fulfil their individualised needs. To that end, it decided to launch its first regional Shoppertainment campaign, Get It Week.

Throughout its campaign, Atome wanted to support businesses that were struggling with lockdowns and help them connect with customers online and grow their omni-channel business; as well as provide shelter-at-home consumers with a safe, secure and easy shopping experience that would allow them the flexibility to make quality and affordable purchases, stretch their budget, while supporting them to shop responsibly.

Strategy

Consumers value flexibility in how they shop and pay. They prioritise smart and responsible shopping, while wanting to have access to rewards that can help maximise their budget. Hence, retailers needed an outlet to tap on digitally savvy shoppers while also providing a seamless omni-channel experience. 

For Atome, it developed a creative strategy that positioned Get It Week with three key differentiations. First, instead of confining sales to a single day event, the campaign would last for a week with exclusive discounts. Also, Atome decided to ditch using KOLs and instead formed the brand’s first animal ambassadors, the Atome Kittens – a play on Atome’s brand name and 1990s British girl band Atomic Kitten. 

Last, Atome would anchor the debut of Atome Kittens through a music video that served to educate. The Atome Kittens were formed by matching the personalities of each kitten to Atome’s core values and merchant types. 

In addition to the discounts and promotions, Get It Week focused on interaction and user education through various social media activities and content such as the #AtomeKittens TikTok dance challenge and talk shows with Atome Kittens to get shoppers involved and entertained amid the lockdown.

Atome hoped to empower shoppers with smart and responsible shopping tools – beyond the usual sales and transaction goals – with its campaign. At the same time, Atome focused on reinforcing its brand awareness and affinity as a brand that is creative, fun and bold.

Execution

Atome went through a lengthy scouting and selection process to recruit the kitten influencers who eventually formed the “Atome Kittens”. The kittens were shortlisted across various social media channels and agencies to ensure the best fit. 

During the production of the debut music video Let’s Get It, Get It, innovative techniques were incorporated with the production house to create the kitten vocals and music. Interactive prototyping was also used to form background sets with the kittens moving and acting according to the script.

Similar techniques were also used to create effects for the kittens to take on roles as “hosts” of the talk shows with KOLs. Additionally, Atome designed and uploaded challenges such as the #AtomeKittens TikTok dance challenge and the #GetItToWin Instagram filter challenge, on its social media platforms to engage with its consumers.

Marketing wise, Atome partnered with more than 180 retailers in Asia across key categories such as beauty, fashion, homeware and lifestyle, and adopted a 360-degree marketing campaign across offline and online channels. 

To maximise the reach and to create a schedule with weekly activities that consumers could look forward to, the campaign activities were divided into three phases: pre-sales, sales week and post-sales. 

During the pre-sales period, Atome debuted its Atome Kittens music video, Instagram and TikTok live shows with KOLs, the #AtomeKittens TikTok dance challenge and the Instagram #GetItToWin challenge. It also launched its OOH ads during this period. 

The sales period saw mass KOL activations on social media to provide consumers with tips and advice on how to pursue their passions through the available products and services, along with exclusive deals and promotions across key categories on the Atome platform. 

The post-sales period allowed consumers, who had missed out on the earlier sales or needed to do last-minute shopping, to enjoy additional promotions before the campaign ended.

Results

Through Get It Week, and joint marketing, participating merchants saw an average growth in retail orders by 32% across the Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and Hong Kong markets. 

Additionally, the Atome Kittens’ music video had more than 20 million views, and the brand gained 76,000 followers on TikTok and 9,000 on Instagram. On consumer engagement, the #AtomeKittens dance challenge on TikTok garnered over six billion views on the platform. Atome also saw its brand awareness and consideration increase by 1.5 to two times in key markets such as Indonesia.