Political unrest was sweeping Bangkok in March 2010 as the 'Red Shirts' political movement took to the streets of Bangkok, Thailand. Media was focused on the uncertainty, insecurity and diminishing consumer confidence. Upcoming marketing initiatives were under threat.At 9 am on Saturday March 13, another unrelated but equally passionate group was quickly forming into a crowd alongside the red shirts with a distinctly different objective in mind: the purchase of their first dtac 3Gs iPhone. Three weeks earlier, the dtac iPhone launch was shaky amid widespread media commentary doubting dtac’s shift into 3G technology. dtac was also one year behind the leading rival carrier in launching the iPhone.

The agency developed a campaign that achieved 190% of dtac’s sales target at launch and established dtac as the strongest network in the industry. Our strategy was to reach out to Thailand’s most influential IT and mobile phone bloggers, offering insider access to dtac technology and management. Their overwhelmingly positive online recommendation of dtac iPhone 3Gs spun online discussions in 126 separate forums, generating over 3,000 comments and 210,000 views overnight.

In exchange for 'insider info', bloggers were encouraged to share updates on their blogs and twitter accounts.Two weeks into the launch weekend bloggers were updated by dtac’s technical experts on its bandwidth expansion and network infrastructure upgrade plans.

One week to launch, bloggers were tipped off with possible launch dates, launch event venue and proposed tariff packages, prompting online speculation that dtac may be poised to overtake competitors in network capability and value.48 hours to launch bloggers were exclusively briefed on the dtac iPhone 3Gs upcoming launch, toured dtac’s control room (first ever public access) and were given dtac iPhones to test dtac's network strength and superiority.

The campaign generated overwhelmingly positive online recommendation with our 16 influencers creating online discussions in 126 separate forums, generating over 3,000 comments and 210,000 views overnight.

There was no other launch activity beyond this social media PR campaign costing US$21,000.

dtac’s sales objective was 1,000 units of iPhone 3Gs in the first 48 hours of launch. The campaign achieved 1,897 units, achieving 190% of the target.The strong start continued with the first month’s sales of 13,000 dtac iPhone units exceeding the target by 30%.A post-campaign consumer audit indicated that dtac had significantly improved brand equity. For the first time-ever, dtac surpassed its rival as "leader for new products," and improved ratings in network strength, customer service, value for money and product accessibility, all campaign messages. (Source: dtac Brand Audit report)This translated into a 30% increase in data service revenue from carrier switchers by Dec 2010 (Source: Thun Hoon on the web). Monthly data subscribers grew by 69% from 5,880 to 9,447.

"dtac iPhone" became a unique brand identity as it became top 3 most searched keywords on Google Thailand prior to launch.