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Orange wanted to impress the young and playful generation, both as a tech leader, who stands for technology and evolution, and as an important hi-tech retailer in Romania.

In order to reach a target which always wants to be entertained, Orange became an edutainment creator and, for a while, a video game creator, by launching an unconventional retail experience in Orange smart shops: Colonization.

The game was launched by Orange in partnership with Samsung, as a part of the Orange smart shop’s platform Tech a Break. 25 consoles were installed in 25 shops in Romania. The a-synchronistic multiplayer system allowed players to experiment the same game in multiple ways and from different devices, thus engaging the players into an innovative testing session of last generation Samsung products.

Colonizarea was an unconventional experience, a bit surprising and “out of the galaxy”, that addressed the young and passionate fans of the genre. But it made these fans love Orange smart shop and generate buzz for the larger impact, in harmony with the brand’s values.

In the end, Orange didn’t just deliver an unconventional user experience, marketing the retail services and products, but it also developed an ownable digital asset, strongly linked to the brand positioning and also to its retail zone.
General Information:
Strategy:
Strategy: Objectives

Raise awareness about Orange smart shop and its products, among the young target, along with reinforcing the brand’s positioning and values: technology and evolution.

Generate engagement and traffic by better connecting brand experience and services, which in Telco are mostly intangible, to retail locations - the Orange smart shops network.

In order to meet the awareness objectives, we put accent on the maximization of the media reach. In order to evaluate the engagement, we measured the number of the platform registered users and of the game sessions, which were implicitly product-testing sessions.


Target

Young people who use mobile devices as portals to instant entertainment. Heavy consumers of urban culture, outgoing and outspoken, embracing technology as an enabler of personal experiences.


Creative strategy


Challenge

Besides being a mobile telecom leader, Orange Romania is also an important retailer, through the Orange smart shop network. But in the Internet era, it’s hard to make people equally enjoy a store visit, especially young ones… So how to make retail assets more relevant for a generation which has become used to accessing entertainment rather by swiping fingers than sliding doors?

Solution

We started from a straightforward remark: while our target does access a lot of content on their devices, most of the viewing is rather passive. Orange smart shops pride themselves with providing a high level of interaction through their skilled staff and hands-on trial of the latest technology. This resonated best with a very particular form of entertainment, which has become hugely popular: gaming.

Indeed, 45% of 18-35 urban Romanians play games at least weekly (SNA Focus) and 2-4 hours are spent daily in video games ( Ziarul Financiar. “Piaţa de jocuri video din România merge spre 100 de milioane de Euro”, July 2018). Many of them would appreciate an upgrade to the latest technology, showcased in our shops. But hardware alone wouldn't be enough to fully engage them. We needed to have a unique, ownable attraction built into our devices. That's how we decided to take Orange from a technology leader to a video game creator.

Idea

We launched our own, Orange-designed video game which was only available in Orange smart shops, a very unconventional retail experience.

The in-store game Colonizarea (Colonization) was an a-synchronistic multiplayer system allowing players to experiment the same game in multiple ways: 6 missions to be accomplished from 8 smart devices.

The game was launched by Orange, as part of “Tech a Break” (a tech events platform, hosted by Orange smart shop), in partnership with Samsung.

Media strategy

The game was available for playing exclusively in Orange smart shops, between May 22nd – August 12th 2018, and it was promoted with an integrated campaign through the following media channels: in-store, online, outdoor, social media and PR.
Execution:
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