HSBC RAIL BUSINESS AWARDS 2009
Nomination:
National Express East Coast (NXEC)
Category:
Marketing Excellence of the Year
Title of Entry:
The Miniature Prices campaign
SUMMARY
In autumn 2008 NXEC launched its first ever TV campaign to promote its advance purchase fares,
drive leisure travel and boost brand awareness of National Express as the train operator along the
East Coast Main Line.
The TV campaign utilised the adaptable ‘Miniature Prices’ creative concept, bringing to life a model
sized miniature world which was also applied to all supporting marketing activity ensuring a
consistent ‘miniature’ theme throughout.
The campaign was highly successful, boosting sales at traditionally quiet periods for travel,
acquiring new first-time customers and delivering over £15M of incremental revenue. Postcampaign research revealed that an impressive 61 per cent of the general public had recalled
seeing the TV adverts and that 1 in 4 of the general public were aware that NXEC operated trains
along the ECML.
BACKGROUND
In 2008 NXEC launched the innovative ‘Miniature Prices’ campaign to promote its advance
purchase fares, destinations along the ECML route and drive leisure travel revenue.
Creatives for the campaign were based around a specially-created miniature railway, made by the
famous model railway makers Hornby, featuring different destinations, landmarks and travellers
appropriate to the audience being targeted.
The creative was designed to be adaptable across all media and used for tactical/promotional
messages throughout the lifetime of the campaign, including TV, radio, online, direct marketing,
email, point of sale and outdoor advertising (in all formats).
Following a successful campaign in Q1 2008 using the outdoor and online Miniature Prices
creative (which delivered over £4M in incremental revenue), the campaign was bought to life as a
series of TV adverts that were used to bolster the campaign in Q3/Q4 2008 and Q1 2009.
The TV campaign was NXEC’s first venture into television advertising. It also had the additional
aim of creating awareness of National Express as the train operator along the ECML. To
supplement the headline fare activity, a number of additional tactical promotions were also used
using the Miniature Prices concepts.
To ensure regional coverage was strong, the TV campaign was broadcast on ITV, C4 and C5 in
London, Yorkshire, Tyne Tees and Scottish Television and was supported by activity in press,
radio, door drops, online and outdoor and across all media owned by NXEC (station, online, Travel
Centres).
The target audience for the campaign was ABC1 adults along the ECML with a high propensity to
travel by rail.
CAMPAIGN OBJECTIVES
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To inspire leisure customers to travel to great destinations
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To promote headline Standard single fares (web only) on key leisure flows
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Create stimulating reasons to travel with NXEC
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Develop a flexible creative that can be used across a wide range of media
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Deliver a campaign that launches National Express as a train operator along the ECML (to
ensure that there is no confusion over the campaign being for rail rather than National Express
coaches which also run along the ECML)
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To contain within the essence of the campaign, ‘Making Travel Simpler’ (either explicit or
otherwise), which is the brand positioning of National Express
CAMPAIGN CREATIVE
Developed by CDP (now Densu London), the TV campaign creative followed the successful
‘miniature prices in a miniature world’ concept already used for press, outdoor and online
campaigns.
The commercials focussed on four key city destinations along the ECML route – Edinburgh,
Newcastle, York and London – highlighting local history, activities and tourist attractions offering a
number of inspiring reasons to get on board and travel with NXEC.
Directed by director, animator and writer Darren Walsh (who also created the multi-award winning
Sony Bravia ‘Play-Doh’ rabbits adverts) and featuring a voiceover from the start of TV’s Peep
Show comedy, David Mitchell, the commercials brought humour and engagement to a sector (the
rail industry) where price messaging can overshadow creativity.
The commercials used stop-frame animation and took place in their own beautifully designed
miniature world, which took a team of ten highly skilled model makers eight weeks to create and
complete.
The adaptability of the miniature prices concept has also enabled it to be used for tactical purposes
(e.g. seasonal events, data acquisition campaigns) which have included:
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Promotion of Christmas and New Year reservations opening (October 2009)
Acquisitions campaigns (data collection/competitions) (throughout late 2008 and 2009)
Seasonal events (summer 2009)
E-mail newsletters (monthly)
CAMPAIGN COSTS
The approximate costs for the TV campaign and supporting outdoor, radio, online and press
advertising across the two bursts of activity (Q3/4 2008 and Q1 2009) were:
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c.£400k for production and creative costs (production of TV, radio and additional outdoor,
online, press used for Q3/4 2008 and Q1 2009)
The media costs for Q3/4 2009 were £2M and £1.9M in Q1 2009, total campaign
Total campaign costs - £4.3M
CAMPAIGN IMPLEMENTATION
The campaign was delivered in two bursts to drive sales and reverse the traditional seasonal
downturn in demand for leisure travel during two traditionally quieter periods of travel – post School
holidays/Winter and post-Christmas. During there period there was also the spare capacity,
particularly at off-peak times, ensuring that lots of customers are able to take advantage of the
cheap fares which were advertised.
The media for the campaign was planned and booked by MPG.
TV
TV was used to drive mass awareness and impact. It was decided to use regional terrestrial
channels rather than multi-channel activity for this campaign as this was the most cost-effective
option, given that the target market were located within the ECML corridor.
Whilst multi-channel activity would have had a national reach, any increases in efficiency in using
these channels were significantly outweighed by the ‘wastage’ (eg broadcast in non-ECML
regions) and increased capital cost.
The approach taken was to use the following regional TV regions:
 ITV1 London, Channel 4 London, & Five London
 ITV1 Yorkshire/Tyne Tees, Channel 4 North, Five North
 ITV1 Scottish TV (STV), Channel 4 Scotland, & Five Scotland
6 different TV executions were developed (appendix 1):
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London Guard (20 and 10 seconds) – cheeky visitors have fun at Buckingham Palace
London Shopping (20 and 10 seconds) – a shopper gets all in a spin
York Viking (20 and 10 seconds) – the scene reveals a Viking battle re-enactment with a
twist.
Newcastle Angel (20 and 10 seconds) a woman goes literally head over heels for the Angel
of the North
Edinburgh bagpipes (20 and 10 seconds) – a lively bagpipe player steals the show
Generic train at station (10 seconds) – price message on notice board adapted for each
region.
The ratio of 20”/10 TV adverts was planned to build awareness of the campaign through increased
levels of 20” and then to maintain impact for a further few months through up-weighting the 10”
adverts. Overall the ratio of 20”/10” was 44%/56%.
Outdoor Campaign
Multiple formats (appendix 2) were used including:
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6, 8 and 46 sheets roadside billboards in key regions along the route.
Tube Car Panels (TCP’s) on London underground and Newcastle Metro
Escalator Panels on London underground and Newcastle Metro
LUL Cross Tracks
Double Royals
Transvision (big cinema type screens at major stations ie. Waverley, London Kings Cross)
Posters were also placed at all railway stations along the ECML which NXEC calls at including:
Edinburgh, Newcastle, Darlington, Durham, Leeds, York, Peterborough, Newark and London.
The outdoor campaign was placed in areas with a high penetration of ABC1’s and with people with
a higher propensity to travel by rail.
To bolster and extend the outdoor campaign, a door drop was also issued to 1 million homes
(targeting ABC1 hotspots) along the East Coast.
Online
Fully animated banners (appendix 3) were used across multiple sites and sizes including:
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Ebay
Travel Supermarket
Cheapflights
Regional Emails
Regional e-mails (appendix 4) were also sent out to 1.2M people along the ECML to generate
further call to action. An e-mail was sent each month during the campaign periods, to reinforce the
leisure fares message using the Miniature Prices creative. The e-mails included special offers,
hotel deals and information on events and attractions at specific destinations and were tailored
according to the region the recipient resided in or had shown an interest in travelling to. This
information is taken from the NXEC website database. Where relevant emails were also given
seasonal themes, eg. winter and festive breaks (appendix 5)
Tactical adverts
Additional seasonal adverts (appendix 6) were also designed and used to promote high-profile
events which were taking place along the ECML including the Ashes, Leeds Film Festival and Kew
Gardens. The concepts were produced as posters to refresh the outdoor campaign which had run
earlier in 2009.
Tactical one big prize campaign
In autumn 2008, an acquisition campaign to deliver new registrations online was also developed
using the Miniature Prices theme. Working with regional tourist boards along the East Coast a
competition was put together that delivered 13,000 new registrations as well as generating
incremental sales.
The competition promoted our hero destinations through offering one lucky winner the opportunity
to win one big prize which comprised four miniature breaks - one to each of the hero destinations
featured on the TV advertising: London, Edinburgh, York and Newcastle/Gateshead.
A range of traditional NXEC media (appendix 7) were used to promote the competition including:
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Leaflet - 6 page (issued through Telesales, On board, Lounges, Travel Centres)
Posters
Web pages
Tent Cards
Entry Boxes
Radio Scripts
Staying faithful to the miniature theme, two humorous regional radio scripts were developed which
featured a voiceover from Joshua Williams (aged 4), the smallest voiceover artist in Britain,
announcing another year of miniature prices by train.
Radio was used in Q1 2009 to re-fresh the campaign in the regions where the outdoor campaign
had been used already in 2008.
The radio stations used were:
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102.7 Hereward FM
Mercury FM (Herts)
96 Trent FM
Century Radio (North East)
Metro Radio/Magic 1152
Real Radio (Scotland)/96.3 Rock Radio
Total Radio Forth
Total Radio Clyde
96.3 Radio Aire
Trax FM
Minster FM
Christmas database opening
The adaptability of the Miniature Prices concept has meant that it can be used for almost any
communication carried out by the marketing team.
It was also used to communicate the opening of the Christmas and New Year reservations on 2
October 2009. The creative (appendix 8) was used to stimulate forward bookings for
Christmas/New Year and
was communicated across the first two weeks in October through:
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Email alerts (notifiying customers that their chosen dates of travel are now available for
sale)
Station posters
On-train post cards
NXEC online banners
Nationalrail.co.uk banners.
CAMPAIGN EFFECTIVENESS
Post-campaign research to measure the effectiveness of each burst of the campaign was carried
out. This was measured through:
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Siebel (NXEC.com web revenue and trend analysis)
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Up to 15 web surveys (up to 5k respondents per wave) with Standard Advance customers,
First Advance customers and Saver/Business Saver customers
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1200 face-to-face street interviews across key cities along the route (pre and post campaign
interviews with the general public) to establish awareness and brand tracking.
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Lennon Data (revenue/journey and trend analysis)
Significant Commercial Success
Q3/4 2008
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It was encouraging to note that the campaign acquired new customers. Research revealed
that 17%-19% of Standard Advance purchasers were making their first journey with NXEC
in the last 12 months.
•
Between 5.7% and 11.9% of all Standard advance journeys between August 2008 and
December 2008 were generated by the campaign (in addition 4.8%-6.8% of First Advance
and 4.2%-5.7% of Standard Flexible tickets were also generated),
•
Against a target of £7M, the revenue tracked through the campaign was £6.879M, a media
ROI of 3.53:1.
2009 Q1 research result
•
Between 6.1% and 14.5% of all Standard Advance journeys between Jan 09 and May 2009
were generated by the campaign (in addition 2%-7.9% of First Advance and 2.6%-5.0% of
Standard Flexible tickets were also generated).
•
Against a target of £4.8M, the revenue tracked through the campaign was £8.09M, a media
ROI of 4.26.
•
The increased ROI delivered by the campaign was the result of media deflation (the ability
to buy more adverts with the same level of spend) and a campaign/creative that benefited
from strong awareness that ‘carried over’ from 2008, allowing the campaign to deliver
strong results from the outset.
Positive passenger perceptions
Q3/4 2008 research result
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From the brand tracking survey conducted with the general public in all the TV regions
along the ECML, 47% of adults recall seeing the advertisements on TV. It is generally
considered that recall above 40% is "excellent".
2009 Q1 research result
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The campaign delivered extremely strong awareness levels and continued to establish
NXEC as the operator of the ECML:
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26% of the general public are aware of NX as a TOC
20% know (without prompting) that NX run the ECML which increases to 36% after
prompting
48% are aware of the miniature prices posters
An impressive 61% claim to have seen 'any' of the TV adverts
18% have heard the radio advert
Marketing industry recognition
In April 2009, the Miniature Prices campaign won four awards at the prestigious Roses Advertising
Awards. The Roses are a celebrated marketing industry awards scheme for advertising
campaigns which are undertaken regionally. NXEC won:
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Gold Award for the coveted Client of the Year - this is only awarded to one company and
recognises their overall excellence in marketing
Gold Award for the Best Television Campaign
Silver Award for the Best Television Campaign of 20 Seconds or less
Silver Award for the Best Outdoor Campaign