Ben® is a mobile telecom provider. Fifteen years ago, mobile phones were only for businessmen. Ben® made it possible for everyone to be always connected. But now that we are, Ben® realized how lovely it could sometimes be, not to be.

Ben® says: You don’t have to be always connected just because it’s possible.

You’re connected because you want to be. There’s so much more to life than staring at that little screen.

On TV, Ben® introduced a revolutionary idea: Your mobile’s OFF switch.

Then we introduced the phone-free Sunday PR activation.

A stimulus for a national discussion about today’s connectivity.

A week earlier, with #benevenuit, we persuaded influentials to post varying opinions on Twitter. With Ben® we merely facilitated the ongoing discussion by delivering the right content and tools, making it easier for people to share. It was just before phone-free Sunday, with the current discussion well underway, that we approached the press.

With phone-free Sunday we succeeded, in just eight days, in cranking up a national discussion. Firstly, we used new media: trending topic and thousands of posts, then in the final phase with extensive coverage in the national press.

It was the right subject at the right time. #benevenuit reached more than 5.5 million people. With a PR value of €1,028,145 we demonstrated that we know what’s going on in the Netherlands. And how phone-free Sunday inspired both the press and the public to have opinions, and share them with one another.

Ben® is a Dutch telecom provider with 450,000 customers that scores extremely highly on brand awareness and customer satisfaction. A provider asking you to switch off your phone for a day could be pushing its credibility. But with its personal approach, relevant and refreshing calls-to-actions, Ben could get away with it.

With phone-free Sunday Ben® wanted to stimulate people’s awareness of the role telephones play in their lives. But it needed to reach a few million people by winning over, retaining and binding current and future fans. Brand preference is crucial if there’s little room for product differentiation.

Within eight days the thinking behind phone-free Sunday was turned into a national conversation piece, thanks to: #benevenuit, the website and the use of PR.

In no time we succeeded in starting up a hot topic of conversation. Firstly, through new media: trending topic, thousands of posts and reaching millions of people. And finally with extensive national press coverage.

PR value

Total print PR value €155,770

Total online PR value €629,410

Total RTV media value €242,965

Total PR value €1,028,145

(see attachment: publicatieoverzicht-Benevenuit.pdf)

Social media

Social media reach: 5.5 million people

The results were calculated by Coosto

We put the hash tag in a query and closely monitored it.

The number of tweets was counted and the cumulative reach (total impressions) was thereby obtained.

Budget of the entire project €45,000

The total PR value achieved €1,028,145

Phone-free Sunday was introduced on 17 February and implemented on Sunday, 23 February 2014. The decision to go public eight days beforehand was a practical one: because we’d only decided to organise it two weeks earlier.

We decided to work as one team, ignoring the boundary between client and agency. We added social media and PR experts from the core team. There was one focus: facilitating the dialogue on social media and then the media itself. All in one week.

Non-stop content that people could share was created. We engaged our network and asked experts to relate their experiences of today’s connectivity. We relayed their tweeted quotes to the press.

Quickly launching a theme like this on social media is difficult, but with the right people we succeeded. Deciding to approach the press at the last-minute also paid off; media communication took off during the last two days.

Truth be told, Ben didn’t have much to say at the beginning of this year. A new proposition had been shelved and the provider lacked a distinctive product offering. Despite this, Ben clearly felt the need to communicate.

We soon started wondering why Ben had so little to say. As a brand it always had the knack of raising relevant topics and getting to the heart of what interests people.

People have an almost intimate relationship with their phone. By starting the dialogue about that fixation in a light-hearted manner, Ben found a very good reason to start communicating again.

The “Ben® even uit” campaign made people smile and made them think.

First, a TV commercial pointed out the telephone’s OFF switch. With a nod and a wink we sold the OFF switch as a “Revolutionary idea, press it sometimes.” Obviously, all phones sold at Ben.nl afterwards were given an exclusive OFF switch.

The PR-activation introduced a phone-free Sunday: a day without a phone, to kick-start the discussion about today’s connectivity.

We deliberately chose one moment to inject urgency into the discussion.

Our initial focus was cranking up the discussion on social media. A week earlier, with #benevenuit, we persuaded influentials to fuel the discussion by posting opinions on Twitter about our relationship with our phones. Ben® facilitated the discussion by delivering the right content and tools, making it easier for people to share. Two days before phone-free Sunday, with the current discussion well underway, we approached the press.