Background:

IBM Australia is able to offer pressurised Australian companies high-quality IT outsourcing.

However, there was very little awareness of this in IT Departments, where CIO’s had been finding themselves increasingly forced to cut back on their resources.

Most were having to live by the mantra of “Do more with less”.

To educate and inform these CIO’s, IBM wanted to stage an event. But, given the
enormous demands on their time, getting these individuals to take an hour out of their day to attend meant the content and the invitation needed to be irresistible.

Idea:

This idea was based on the simple human truth that sometimes it makes more sense to get someone else to do menial tasks for you. As an analogy Ogilvy used an everyday chore, mowing the lawn. More and more wealthy homeowners (like the CIO’s) have been engaging mowing companies who do the job faster, better and even cheaper than they could do it themselves.

Results:

This invitation impressed 147 of Australia’s busiest CIO’s enough for them to register for a  2½ -hour lunchtime session. As a direct result, in the first month of 2012, IBM Managed Services exceeded 87% of the pipeline target for the whole year.

Comment

Psychologists say Mail works better than other media because you can handle it. Simply turning it over in your fingers leads to a deeper, longer-lasting emotional connection.

What you get is a real experience and so a mailing like this becomes a positive memory of the brand in a way that traditional advertising can’t. So, though Mail is most often used tactically, to achieve short-term objectives, there is an argument that says it is better for long-term brand building than traditional ‘above-the-line;’ media.

Client: IBM
Country: Australia
Date of campaign: December 2011
Agency: Ogilvy Sydney
Creative Director: Barrie Seppings
Associate Creative Director/Art Director: Fiona Seton
Copywriter: Kiriana Wheaton