MTR’s first O+O campaign wins big at Spark Awards HK 2023

MTR’s remarkable campaign “Virtual Walk 25 - Walk with You” won two gold and two silver awards at MARKETING-INTERACTIVE’s Spark Awards for Media Excellence 2023. The campaign’s success perfectly demonstrates how MTR lives up to its brand promise “Keep Cities Moving” with its effort to cheer up Hong Kong people in face of the fifth wave of the COVID-19 outbreak.

The pandemic last year caused unprecedented pressure on all in Hong Kong. MTR is well aware of Hong Kong people’s needs for emotional support to stay motivated in life. The “Virtual Walk 25 – Walk with You” campaign therefore aimed at injecting positive energy and motivation into life by encouraging people to explore the city whenever, wherever and however they liked. To make the experience more unique, MTR came up with a gamified physical exercise idea. Through a Virtual Walk app, people could explore the beauty of Hong Kong from any of the 16 attractive routes anytime and anywhere, each with MTR station as the starting point.

One of the major highlights of the campaign was the high engagement with audiences and participants via the digital journey radiated from the Virtual Walk 25 app to MTR digital panels and MTR Mobile. While participants navigated via the Virtual Walk 25 app and leveraged the attractions offered via Metaverse, MTR optimised engagement and connection with Gen Zs and Millennials.

During the campaign, participants could gain scores by completing designated routes. The first five participants with the highest scores on each route would be awarded a special edition NFT. Other participants’ effort was acknowledged by physical medals, MTR points, digital coupons as well as having their social posts featured via various MTR digital panels. All these priceless recognitions eventually attracted thousands of people to join, of which more than 12,000 of them completed all routes. And over three million MTR points were redeemed.

What’s more, it was the first multi-stakeholder online-plus-offline (O+O) campaign organised by MTR’s Media and Business Development Section and supported and marketed by Asiaray and JCDecaux. The campaign reach was optimised across the entire MTR advertising network with both digital and non-digital advertising assets.

On top of MTR advertising network, great emphasis on promoting the campaign was placed via MTR Mobile, online channels and social platforms, maximising the efficacy of various digital touchpoints as well as engaging people continuously. With such extensive media coverage, the campaign accumulated more than 3.5 million reaches and over 30,000 app downloads.

With the success of MTR’s first O+O campaign, MTR was thrilled to have its efforts recognised by the Spark Awards 2023, earning two golds in the major categories of “Best Media Campaign – Out-of-Home” and “Best Media Campaign – Digital”, and two silvers in the categories of “Best Result-Driven Campaign” and “Best Use of Mobile/App”, more than that, we also were shortlisted as the finalists in other six categories.

MTR’s ongoing mission is to continue delivering the brand promise “Keep Cities Moving” with more innovative solutions to serve Hong Kong people while meeting marketers’ dynamic needs.

The categories shortlisted are as below: -

Best Media Campaign – Out-of-Home *Gold

Best Media Campaign – Digital *Gold

Best Use of Mobile/App *Silver

Best Result-Driven Campaign *Silver

Best Engagement Strategy *Finalist

Best Media Campaign – Creative *Finalist

Best Media Campaign – Integrated Media *Finalist

Best Promotion Strategy *Finalist

Best Use of Multi-Channels *Finalist

Best Use of Technology *Finalist

This article is sponsored by MTR Corporation.