Australian As It Gets
CGU Insurance
Issue 47 | June 2018
Agency
The Monkeys
Creative Team
Co-founder & Group Chief Creative Officer Scott Nowell Creative Director Ben Sampson Senior Art Director Chloe Banicevic Senior Copywriter Archana Murugaser
Production Team
Head of Production Thea Carone Integrated Producer Tanith Williamson Design Lead James Halliday Designer/Finished Artist Lucinda Hansen Production Company Exit Films Sound Design Song Zu Music Manchester Orchestra
Other Credits
Co-founder & Group CEO Mark Green Managing Director Matthew Michael Executive Planning Director Fabio Buresti Strategic Planner Henry Bilson Group Content Director Humphrey Taylor Senior Content Director Samantha Heckendorf Senior Content Manager Jack Stone Content Executive Sophie Finckh PR Company Boxing Clever Client Chief Marketing Officer Brent Smart Marketing Director Kate Wellard Creative Lead Louise Lynch Marketing Executive Claire Jewell
Date
January 2018
Background
CGU Insurance embarked on their first awareness campaign in 160 years wanting to be seen as a progressive force in Australia.
Research they commissioned revealed that 1/3 of Australian small businesses were owned by immigrants.
Despite the fact that three-quarters of Australians thought the country was ‘already full’, CGU saw there was an opportunity to champion the amazing contribution migrant small business owners made.
Idea
The strategic insight, backed up by the data, was that migrants often demonstrated those qualities Australians admired most in themselves, qualities such as grit, determination, hard work and resilience. The idea was to get the country to re-think Australian-ness by identifying migrant small business owners as being as ‘Australian as it gets’.
In addition to publishing The Migrant Report, which detailed the statistics of how much migrant small businesses contributed to the country, a series of films were made for TV, cinema and social media. These told the real and amazing stories of hard-working migrants. Provocatively launched on Australia
Day, the campaign stimulated debate on national news channels and in government, sparking a conversation on the contribution of migrants to Australia.
Results
The launch film reached over 15 million on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter in Australia in just a few short weeks with a 92.5% online video completion rate, an increase of 25% compared to previous campaigns.
94,480 page views were generated leading to an uplift in brand interest of 1772%.
The advertising gained a 43% increase in recognition compared to the previous CGU campaigns. It created a positive impact on the brand, with many seeing CGU as more caring and empathetic, an increase of 35.7% from previous campaigns.
And even though it wasn’t the primary objective of the campaign, ‘Australian as it gets’ generated a 10% increase in like for like online sales.
Our Thoughts
Diversity is an issue in many countries right now as immigration becomes a political hot potato. Not so long ago, it would never have occurred to a brand that it could, or even should, adopt a political stance. Increasingly, though, as the institutions of state seem helpless in their ability to deal with social issues like this, brands like CGU can be of real influence.
Ten years from now, people will look at this campaign and wonder what on earth it was about. Being egalitarian, generous and conscientious have always been and will continue to be the characteristics of all true Aussies. By the way, on pages 78-79 you can see how the AFL has tackled the same subject of inclusion, by telling the stories of two Australian sports fans, one of whom happens to be brown, the other who happens to be black.