Ramadan has ended, and most of the country has moved back to the normal groove of things. Think Marketing is taking a look back at the past month’s online advertising campaigns, to keep marketers on their toes for next year’s Ramadan Superbowl.
Running with the numbers
Winning the most viewed ad so far has been Vodafone, with a total of over 68 million views on all platforms. Orange is a close second with their Henedy ad at over 50 million views.
Although Vodafone has a clear advantage, having have released their ad earlier than Orange and having the most views so far, Orange had a real chance to beat out Vodafone for the biggest ad of this year. On the first of June, Vodafone reached its peak viewership, and new views progressively decreased since then. Orange, on the other hand, had a more stable viewership, continuing to have high levels of views every day, although it slowly also decreased but not as much as Vodafone.
Vodafone continues its winning streak as the most shared ad of Ramadan 2017, scoring over 260k shares.
Trending celebrities and new brand faces
The usual trends that have continued throughout the years have returned, such as musical advertising such as Vodafone, celebrity marketing such as with power couple Amr Youssef and Kinda Alloush.
This Ramadan has also produced great advertisements with some new interesting trends. The emotional advertising focusing on Ramadan themes such as Almarai while mixing the socio-economic status for the society specially for Saudi Arabia and GCC markets.
Funny Ads = Viral Campaign?
Fast paced dialogue is a form of scriptwriting that has characters speaking in rapid succession. This year, many companies and agencies have decided to use this method of dialogue for their advertisements, to well received success.
Carrier, Midea, Teama Milk and Coca Cola have all used this form of dialogue and their ads have been received positively. Other brands and agencies have also used fast paced dialogue to moderate success.
Carrier and Teama Milk’s advertisements have become extremely popular due to their quick and witty script.
The most talked about ad so far this Ramadan has got to be EGBank’s advertising series, about how a young man is not appreciated or taken care of.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3boTLbupM_c
The bank has recently moved forward with an aggressive expansion and brand awareness campaign to improve their presence in the country. The series of videos have been declared by many as one of the best ad campaigns this Ramadan, being both funny and relatable to its target audience.
Avant Garde/Modern take on advertising
An unseen form of advertising and film making has made itself a space in Egypt’s advertising world this Ramadan. Modern, colorful, fun and light, Modern or Avant Garde video isn’t a common sight in Egypt but these three brands made it their own.
Nestle’s Mega Ice Cream, Lamar Juice and Gloria Ceramic have taken innovative steps in the industry, allowing their agencies free reign to create some great work.
Nestle’s Mega Ice Cream has been praised by many in the creative field as pioneering work in the country’s industry, and the public has had positive reactions to the work.
Ramadan Campaigns Tactical Moves
This year, brands have taken extra steps when it comes to their planning.
Vodafone Egypt get immunized:
In order to combat last year’s negative feedback for their overuse of celebrities and budget, Vodafone first released a Ramadan ad for their foundation. By releasing a charitable and caring video first, Vodafone was able to lessen the negative feedback they would receive on their annual high-budget music video.
Pepsi Hit:
PepsiCo’s Pepsi campaign this year has been hailed as a great accomplishment for the brand. The campaign uses digital video to bring a group of three people together to watch the full ad, effectively bringing people to spend time together.
Coca Cola Response:
As an attempt to fight back against Pepsi’s popular 3-way video, Coca Cola released their second Ramadan advertisement. Their second ad was much better received than its original Ramadan ad, and beat out Pepsi’s viewership by reaching over 2.1 million views.
Read: How to ask for a vacation? Coca Cola super convincing team got the answer!
Whether the video was prepared beforehand or was created due to Pepsi’s success, we may never know, but Coca Cola’s planning/persistence definitely helped them this year.
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