Leaving Card
O2
Issue 8 | September 2008
Agency
archibald ingall stretton…
Creative Team
Steve Stretton – Creative Partner; Martin Lythgoe – Deputy Creative Director / Art Director ; Holly Brockwell – Copywriter ; Jay Booth – Interactive Designer ; Paul Grainger – Typography; Ellis Faint – Designer ;Andrea Smith – Designer
Production Team
Williams Lea Wrights
Other Credits
Melanie Schouw – Account Director ;Emma Shuttleworth – Account Manager ;Julie Borrows – Planner ;Paul Tully – Production Manager
Date
June 2008 - Ongoing
Background
O2 needed to devise a mailing to encourage customers who had cancelled their contract to reconsider their decision and stay with the network.The aim was to show departing customers that O2 is sorry to see they’re leaving, and to ask for one last chance to persuade them to stay.
Idea
People who have just cancelled their contracts are unlikely to respond to branded communications, especially marketing, from a company they feel they’ve left. Therefore, O2’s leaving message needed to look unbranded and feel like a personal communication. The natural format to choose was a leaving card with handwritten messages inside.
The card arrives on the recipient’s doormat in an unbranded white envelope with a real first-class stamp and the address in a hand-written font. The inside of the card contains a selection of ‘hand-written’ messages, personalised with the customer’s first name and signed by people at O2. The messages incorporate benefits of being with O2 and extras the customer could get if they stayed, but with a personal, non-salesy, tone. One reads, 'If you go, you’ll miss out on priority tickets to The O2, but we hope you’ll still drop in from time to time. See you there. Penny'. The back of the card encourages the customer to call O2, and even has a barcode and price. An accompanying email execution contains an animated graphic of the message 'Sorry to hear you’re leaving'.
Target audience
O2 customers who have cancelled their monthly phone contract.
Volume/size of campaign
Initial print run of 30,000. Ongoing.
Our Thoughts
This would have been a tricky brief though the solution looks deceptively easy. How can you persuade people who’ve made up their minds to take their business elsewhere to think again? By reminding them what they’ll be missing in a way that is pleasant and personable.