#LEAwards 2020 highlight: Senoko Energy powers up live marketing in loyalty push

The open electricity market in Singapore has been cluttered since its launch in late 2018, as competitors fight on price, partnerships and promotions. Senoko Energy was aggressive with building allies and offered compelling plans to entice consumers. It also built extensive partnerships with Philips, Toggle and StarHub. To make the brand stand out from the crowd, Senoko Energy embarked on the Senoko Power Gig campaign, which saw it bagging the bronze award for the Best use of Experiential Live Marketing campaign during MARKETING-INTERACTIVE’s Loyalty & Engagement Awards 2020. Find out more about Senoko Energy’s secret sauce to success.

Challenge

The brand felt the full effects of the pandemic earlier this year and had to relook at its marketing approach. Having established a presence and offered energy to generations of Singaporeans since 1977, the brand sought to remain relevant and resonate with clients, especially during this challenging time. The brand wanted to figure out how it could fully embody the spirit of “Energy for life” and be life-giving. 

Strategy

The drastic circuit breaker measures introduced earlier this year led Senoko Energy to believe that it was crucial for it to maintain a positive spirit and do good. With more consumers staying home, the brand wanted to find a way to marry the changing consumption habits while raising awareness and driving donations. This led the team to think of the Senoko Power Gig, which brought together Singaporean artists to provide entertainment from their living rooms to other Singaporeans’ living rooms.

This was in support of The Invictus Fund, which was launched by the Community Chest in light of the pandemic. The fund will channel private donations to social service agencies that deliver critical services to vulnerable groups in the community.

Ahead of the upcoming long weekend on Labour Day, which fell in the midst of circuit breaker, Senoko Energy, together with digital agency GERMS, who also took home the overall Loyalty Agency of the Year title, wanted to do good when morale was low. It decided to raise donations for The Invictus Fund through an online music festival. It got Mediacorp YES933 onboard as the official radio station and rallied together a list of local artists who were familiar to both the English and Mandarin segments to cater to a wider range of audiences.

Titled "The Power Gig", the charity event aimed to raise as much money as possible in support of the fund, and every dollar raised was matched by Senoko Energy dollar for dollar, up to SG$30,000. It also leveraged the Labour Day long weekend to launch the festival to drive hype and chatter.  

The festival continued through the weekend with the Power Live segment, which had 10 independent local musicians perform their originals on their own Instagram accounts, at various time slots across the three days. Additionally, Senoko Energy also saw the music festival as an opportunity to share more about its services, putting forth a promotional code to enable consumers to enjoy greater rebates when signing up. The music festival also offered a starting point for the public to become familiar with the brand, and discover other relevant content assets.

Execution

Senoko Energy and GERMS registered the domain www.senokopowergig.com as a one-stop site to house all necessary information about The Invictus Fund, the artists, the performance schedule, as well as the donation link. With the Community Chest’s support, the team also created a unique donation link to track and capture the progress of funds raised specific to this initiative.

The music festival kicked off on 1 May, Friday from 4pm to 6pm with a Facebook livestream performance targeting over a quarter of a million followers, as well as a national radio broadcast on YES933. Thereafter, the festival continued over the long weekend with a Power Live Segment where 10 more artists performed live at home on their Instagram channels until 3 May, Sunday.

The brand also leveraged social media to raise awareness of the event and ride on the star power of the artists to appeal for donations. Social media was also used to countdown to the event, creating anticipation and excitement. When the event ended, Senoko Energy took to Facebook to thank all artists and donors, as well as announced the total amount raised – SG$50,000. The brands and artists themselves also highlighted the event on their own social media pages prior to the weekend.

Besides social media, Senoko Energy also sent out an EDM to its customer base, including residential and corporate partners. At the same time, it also pushed out messages on WhatsApp and Telegram, tapping on the speed of messages being shared across messaging apps.

Results

Through the Power Gig, Senoko Energy raised SG$50,000 for The Invictus Fund and also grew awareness for the brand’s offerings. The impacted continued through to business uplift for the month, and according to Senoko Energy, this led to business translations too. The event website drew more than 3,000 users and its social media marketing efforts also paid off, with a double-digit spike in traffic driven through these channels. The campaign also clocked one of the highest impressions on social media and the highest link clicks and engagements during the month of May, Senoko Energy said. Additionally, the campaign was also picked up by media outlets including Channel NewsAsia, TODAY and Channel 8.