Lost in the numbers

It is no secret that Ramadan is one of the most important commercial opportunities for advertisers in the Middle East. As one of the busiest periods of the year, it also represents a huge moment for advertising platforms: up to a third of advertisers' yearly budgets are spent during Ramadan, launching a fierce competition between media entities, all racing for the largest piece of the pie.

As platforms start to pitch, each one attempting to highlight their unique advantage, advertisers are overwhelmed with metrics, statistics, and figures. Numbers (albeit critical and important for decision makers) are thrown left and right, making it impossible to keep up and keep track.

Given that we had a message to deliver, one that was numbers-driven as well, we wanted TikTok For Business to remain top of mind and memorable.

Numbers worth remembering

At TikTok, we know that the most impactful form of communication is through vertical, sound-on, and immersive video storytelling. At the end of the day, it's what we preach to our clients.

So this year, we wanted to walk the talk. And showcase that potentially boring content - numbers - could be made to stick.

Our idea placed our numbers at the forefront: "Numbers worth remembering," and would be brought to life in a manner fitting to TikTok's DNA.

Entertainment at the heart

In order to create an impactful campaign, we needed to be memorable, relevant, and persuasive. The answer to all three elements was found at the heart of our platform's DNA: entertainment.

Entertainment is one of the key drivers of ad recall and memorability. It is also an intrinsic value to Ramadan, found in the popular culture of TV series.

It seemed a perfect link for our campaign to be brought to life within the thematic of entertainment - falling under the umbrella "based on a true story", because Ramadan on TikTok, was based on a true story: true experiences, true communities, true case studies, and, most importantly, true numbers.

The "based on a true story" approach would further build our core values of storytelling and entertainment, would create the perfect association with Ramadan, and would highlight our true success stories and incontestable platform performance.

A Cinema Experience

Everything from our visual identity, to our sales narrative and packages fell under this umbrella.

The campaign started off with a mini-series: our numbers the star of the show. Each episode was developed with a different business vertical in mind - depicting humorous situations in which the main character uses the numbers to get out of sticky situations.

The numbers themselves were thought-provoking, but also, chuckle-inducing. This made for hilarious and unforgettable situations, intensified by the surprised reactions of the people around him.

The series was launched as an avant-premiere that was fitting to the concept: hiring a small, local cinema and creating an intimate and immersive experience, followed by inspiring speakers and exciting activities.

The episodes were then turned into shorter cutdowns for social media, which, coupled with more informative posts and case studies, drove further awareness across different types of clients.

The launch was a resounding success - with more than 650 brands engaged during our events, 88% positive brand sentiment and 78% recall on the Numbers measured in our post-event survey. The event was such a success that it was replicated across different audiences across different regions and business sectors.

The social release of our series cutdowns and social media content reached upwards of 3M unique users, with a CPM 39% below benchmark and a CPC 28% below benchmark.

As of February 3rd, within a week post-launch, our sales target attainment had reached 48% already representing a 20x ROI.