Tinder’s spot at the top of the dating app category was in danger.

In Japan, matching applications exist for a unique reason, to find a partner to marry. Tinder is the only application that encourages users to explore and date as they want. But within a market where dating is a serious matter, Tinder’s casual approach was seen as a shameful distraction. Our highly coveted audience, Japanese women aged 18 to 24, would rather stay out of Tinder or do it in secret than be seen on it.

With no one to normalize the use of Tinder, registration rates were low among young Japanese women.

Our objective was clear: in order to keep Tinder’s position at the top, we needed to shift the perception around Tinder, from a distraction done in secret to an experience they would be excited to be a part of and share with their friends.

The film, “Konbini Girl”, starts with a young convenience store worker, watching others go out and make the most of their youth. After years of Covid restrictions, she is just like the rest of us, stuck and unable to break out of her monotonous life.

We follow her daily routine: behind the counter greeting customers and scanning items. When she reaches out to grab another item, her hand graces another, their eyes lock, and something sparks within her. We then dive into her imagination, where she experiences everything from love and friendship to the occasional heartbreak.

Suddenly, the film snaps back to reality. We see her swiping through the profiles of everyone she “met” in her daydream whilst on the app.

Through our protagonist, we get to know that a world full of new experiences is all just a swipe away on Tinder.

The tagline reads: Tinder. Live Young

In a market where Tinder was perceived as a suspicious platform, we focused on the beauty and the different emotions that come with meeting people on Tinder and our audience loved it!

The film accumulated over 166 million views on social media while it was also displayed on digital OOH in areas most frequented by our audience.

The association of Tinder with “hook up” decreased among women using the application and overall awareness of Tinder greatly increased amongst our target, outperforming our main competitors.

Despite the stagnant growth of downloads across the dating app category, we saw a significant increase (+24%) in registration and reactivation in the first week of this campaign launch, allowing us to not only change the perception of the brand but also secure Tinder as the top player in the market.