Perhaps the stand out strand of Samsung marketing at this year’s Oscars was the product placement in-show stunt that saw host Ellen Degeneres use a Note 3 device to shatter Twitter records by live posting a celebrity-fuelled selfie.
The real time, multi-star placement did what it set out to do – become the most re-tweeted post in Twitter’s history.
Leaving aside the fact that it seemed a missed opportunity not to give DeGeneres a new Galaxy S5 (and that the host was latter tweeting pictures from backstage from her own iPhone), this was certainly a hugely successful stunt that has earned not only record retweets but also huge media coverage.
This dovetailed with Samsung’s status as ABC’s ‘The Oscars Backstage’ sponsor – which it sponsor of a series of 10 promoted tweets of celebrity selfies taken from the green room and sent from the account of @TheAcademy.
As one of the 2014 Oscar’s main sponsors, Samsung also bought no less than five minutes of airtime during the awards’ ABC telecast.
It used this buy to unveil a new ‘One Samsung’ brand campaign, as well as to roll out its launch commercial for the soon-to-be-released Galaxy S5 smartphone and showcase a range of other products.
Samsung, which has been an Oscar advertiser for the last five years, is using this year’s show to discharge a new all encompassing brand line ‘You need to see this’ – a simple, relatable phrase that will carry across a series of campaigns aimed at celebrated moments experienced through technology.
From kids and young couples, to friends and families, the 90-second film depicts all of America looking at amazing things happening in life (apparently) through Samsung devices.
The brand ad leads a joint campaign from Samsung’s US Mobile and Electronics divisions
It features an array of products from smartwatches and smartphones, to tablets and curved TVs and is also rolling out across digital platforms and social media, as well as on network and cable TV and online after its initial Oscar airing.
The campaign comes just days after Samsung announced a slew of new and revised products including its latest flagship Galaxy S5 smartphone, the Galaxy Gear 2 and Gear 2 Neo smartwatches and the Gear Fit fitness tracker wearable.
These products won’t be hitting the shops until April, but the Korean consumer electronics, mobile and IT behemoth is using The Oscars to showcase its new offerings.
Still a few weeks from release, the flagship Galaxy S5 smartphone featured in its own 30-second dramatic teaser – with creative that subtly connects the product to the Oscars.
Similarly, the ‘gold-themed’ Gear 2 TV spot also seems tailored to run during the Oscars
In addition to the TVCs and the product placement stunt, Samsung also bought space on the official web and mobile Oscars platforms and provided no less than 86 Smart TVs, tablets and smartphones (one for each year of Oscar) that made up one wall of the award show’s green room.
Comment
Samsung has been an Oscar backer for five years – indeed, it is ranked fifth in the table of top TV advertisers on the show over the past five years (according to Kantar Media).
From 2009 through 2013, it invested a massive $24m.
It backs this up with significant digital spent too.
Kantar says that Samsung is also one of three primary official digital spenders too (along with Cadillac and J.C.Penney) – buying display and video execution real estate on the official Oscars website at www.Oscars/.com and on the companion mobile app (both of which are also sold through official broadcaster ABC.
Aside from Samsung official Twitter and selfie activation, this year’s Oscars was awash with real time brand Twitter activity through a slew of marketing stunts, trending topics and particularly star names.
For example, several brands leveraged the appearance of 81-year-old Kim Novak.
On the cynical side, the marketers for the Oxygen program ‘The Face’ bought Promoted Tweets around the #Kim Novak hashtag, whilst official partner American Express and J.C. Penney also has ads for the Novak hashtag.
While T Mobile purchased Twitter Promoted Tweets around the #Leo hashtag.
Links
Samsung Mobile USA Facebook
www.facebook.com/SamsungMobileUSA
Oscars Website
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Website
