One Rand Man, a social experiment
Sanlam
Issue 34 | March 2015
Agency
King James Group, Cape Town
Creative Team
Chief Creative Officer Alistair King Executive Creative Directors Matt Ross Devin Kennedy Creative Director Michael Wilson Art Director Cameron Watson Senior Copywriter Anna Fourie Copywriter Michael Wilson Digital Creative Director Dan Pinch Digital Art Director Hayley More
Production Team
TV Producer Kathi Jones Film Production Company Arcade Director and Editor Robert Smith Producer Will Nicholson Sound Studio Pressure Cooker Media Producer Ryan Eyden
Other Credits
Digital Content Manager Anna-Mart Fourie Business Unit Director Taryn Walker Account Directors Sherilee Cook Lauren Volmink Kelly May Account Managers Anika Theron Tanya Horack Head of Content Julie Etheridge Social Media Writers Marguerite Moody Matthew Stone
Date
July - September 2014
Background
South Africans were some of the worst savers in the world. Household debt averaged 75% of their after-tax income. Sanlam, a leading South African financial services company, wanted to reconnect people to money. Credit cards just encouraged people to spend more and get into financial difficulties.
Idea
The insight that few South Africans were actually aware of how much they were spending came about from asking one simple question: what if someone was cut off entirely from all credit facilities and could only pay for everything with one rand coins?
During National Savings Month, a series of five weekly YouTube webisodes were made, documenting One Rand Man's experiences.
Receiving his entire salary in one rand coins, One Rand Man had to pay all his bills and all his expenses in coins. His day-to-day spending was posted in social media and after each episode, experts writing for South Africa's biggest financial newspaper weighed in with observations about his trials and tribulations.
Episode 1: http://youtu.be/OXzl6epqxmQ
Results
74 million+ media impressions.
R41 million in earned media (£2.2 GBP, €3m).
Over 900,000 video views.
Ranked #1 in the YouTube South Africa leaderboard for July.
The avalanche of media coverage led to an awareness of an urgent shift in behaviour as influencers, the media and the public alike all took to social media channels to express the need for South Africa to control its spending habits.
Our Thoughts
What makes this a classic example of branded content is how uncomfortable it is to watch in places. A real person dealing with an unreal series of situations. Even though you would imagine One Rand Man would have been more considered in how he spent his money, partly because it was all in coins and partly because his every move was being filmed, he wasn’t. He was still irrational about how he spent his money. And tellingly, when he put all his coins into piles for his various expenses, he never even thought about a pile to save.
Not just great content for Sanlam but great content, period.