Weekend Argus (Saturday Edition)
Cooking show a sizzling success
IN AN interesting twist to the argument that traditional media platforms are becoming less relevant due to digital, integrated advertising agency Seven Different Kinds of Smoke has, in an unprecedented move, along with their client Clover and production company Quizzical Pictures, won a Golden Horn at the Saftas (South African Film and Television Awards).
The Saftas celebrate outstanding talent in the local film and television industry. Seven Different Kinds of Smoke had two finalists in the gameshow category in the form of Tropika Island of Treasure and Clover Little Big Cook Off, with Clover’s production winning for best game show.
The Clover Little Big Cook Off competitive cooking show is a promotional campaign that is unique for several reasons, one being that it was the first parent and child cooking show to grace television in South Africa.
The game show was devised by advertising agency Seven Different Kinds of Smoke for their client, Clover, to provide viewers with entertainment and recipe ideas, where the recipes necessarily included products from Clover’s range.
The cooking show essentially gives consumers new ideas and ways in which to use the Clover brand products.
Clover has traditionally been strong in the milk category, but the competition allowed the brand to boost the strength of the other categories the brand offers.
What the campaign achieved was to get the consumer to better understand the diverse offering of the Clover product range in a simple, entertaining and effective way. The results exceeded the agency and client’s expectations. The show averaged 700 000 viewers per episode despite having to compete for viewers during the Fifa World Cup. The viewership was the highest for any cooking show in the country last year, exceeding Masterchef South Africa.
There were more than 150 000 entries in the Little Big Cook Off competition, which drove doubledigit sales for Clover during the call-to-entry phase.
“The goal was never to merely drive viewership. That said, it is great because, over the course of 13 episodes, people got to engage with the brand once a week, for 45 minutes, as opposed to 30-second engagements at a time for a traditional TV ad,” says James Cloete, executive creative director and partner at Seven Different Kinds of Smoke.
The agency handled aspects of the campaign such as on- pack design, in-store point-of-sale material to the incentive programme at the trade marketing level and above the line.
Seven Different Kinds of Smoke also conceptualised and managed the production of the TV show along with Quizzical Pictures.
The Clover story is an example of understanding the consumers and then devising ways to entertain them.
Clover used digital platforms to boost engagement during the show, but what the results also reveal is that the television programme still had the greatest reach driven by the unique way in which the game show connected with its consumers.
“So instead of turning you off, or changing channels, as you would for ad breaks, they’re making an appointment to view you,” said Cloete. “This is the philosophy that drives our core business at Seven Different Kinds of Smoke, regardless of what platform you are using to connect with the habits of your consumer.
“To make great work that works, you need to do things differently and that requires great production partners and most of all smart, brave clients. We’ve been lucky to have had both and we’re very excited to work with them all again now as we build up toward the airing of season two.”