Engage Asian demographics via OTT ad platfrom
2016.07.29
ECI Awards


服务创新类-消费者服务 铜奖


背景&挑战:


As a relatively new media platform: 

iTalkBB Chinese TV makes a breakthrough in changing the way that ethnic-Chinese watch Chineselanguage content in North America, from IPTV to OTT. Our innovative technology ad platform are built on thorough understanding of viewers’ ever changing watching habits. Our media was new to the public a lot of advertisers/agencies did not know about us. We arranged on site presentations to demonstrate our OTT platform advertising capabilities, pin pointed our competitive edge as compared to other Chinese media.


创新思维:


Entering our fourth year, our annual sales the number of long-term clients we have, provided solid proof of our success. This is not just a success for being persuasive, this is an indicator of helping clients achieve desired results leading to long term relationships.  
Working with over 100 brands to reach out to the Asian demographics in North America Australia:

? Customize every media plan based on various needs of agencies/advertisers: Although majority of the clients approached us with a set budget campaign, iTalkBB Media crafts every media buying proposal based on understandings of marketing objectives, target audiences, points of time, roles of iTalkBB Chinese TV in the holistic plan. For example, a national auto group wanted to increase awareness of its sixteen dealerships in British Columbia of Canada.  It is impossible to have all dealer commercials air at the same time.  We provided a customized proposal allowing for flexibility in the number of dealerships on air at any one month, unlimited changes of creatives. We went even a step further to screen translated message voice over prior to airing, making sure the message is clear make sense to Chinese audience.

? Conduct audience research bi-annually to uncover the most up-to-date viewer data that advertisers/agencies value most: In the 2014 viewer survey, iTalkBB Media mainly focuses on the demographic information of viewers. After learning the needs of clients/agencies, iTalkBB Media adds questions related to brand preferences purchasing habits in the 2015 viewer survey. 
? Fulfill their marketing goals through offline advertising opportunities: For brands that are suitable for in desire of creating in-depth engagement with iTalkBB Chinese TV viewers, iTalkBB Media leverages IGC resources other brands of goods services, for co-branding partnership opportunities, including sponsorship, in-store promo events, offline experience marketing, social media two brand trumpet one, etc. 
? Offer Creative Solutions: iTalkBB Media in-house production copywriting team offers creative solutions to advertisers, including big idea, copy writing, script translation, video editing, production, brand identity design; 
? Build a collaborative relationship with clients/agencies: iTalkBB Media is willing to assist advertisers/agencies to realize their marketing goals further with the resources in the advertising industry. For example, iTalkBB Media helped a casino client with forming its internal Chinese social media team; iTalkBB Media referred third party research agency to clients who would like to understand their Chinese-descent consumers; we also introduced technology partners to those who seek for creating a Chinese WeChat account.  
? Assisting small medium-sized business:  To many small medium-size businesses, digital media buy was too unfamiliar to try. iTalkBB Media makes every effort to educate them about the trend of advertising from on TV, newspapers, radios to a more customized, trackable, impressions-driven way on iTalkBB Chinese TV, encourages them to think outside the box when doing the media buy. Due to many small medium-sized clients lack resources to make a holistic media buying plan, iTalkBB Media people always sit with them to understand their needs help them the media plan to appeal to their customers. At the same time, iTalkBB Media in-house creative team supports clients to quality creative commercials based on their brand stories limited budgets.  
? Enhancing cultural relevance: iTalkBB Media motivates advertisers/agencies to try culturally relevant approaches to reach target Chinese-descent audiences, segmented by geographic locations the language of content. When planning with advertisers/agencies, iTalkBB Media recommends that timeline budget allocation of media planning should be based on culturally important events in the Chinese community, such as Chinese Lunar New Year Middle Fall Festival. In addition, iTalkBB Media also provides alternative media engagement solutions other than iTalkBB Chinese TV to help the brand be culturally engaged, such as through WeChat Weibo.


实施过程:


iTalk Global Communications (IGC), the parent company of iTalkBB Media, has 14 years of experience in telecommunication marketing service in Asian communities in North America. IGC devotes itself to satisfying the needs of Asian American through incremental improvement over time: it develops services vertically, from VoIP to Over-the-top(OTT) TV; it expands the service coverage from the U.S. market, to Canada Australia extends the market scope from Chinese to Korean community. IGC’s long time high quality services makes “iTalkBB” one of the most well-known Chinese-brands in North America. By the end of 2015, one out of six Chinese families is an active user of iTalkBB’s services (Exhibit 1 Timeline of Milestones). 
In 2012, IGC launched iTalkBB Chinese TV, the over-the-top TV, to provide customers both video-ondemand live streaming Chinese-language content produced in Asia, especially Mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong. Programs range from daily news, dramas, varieties, movies. (Exhibit 2 TV Content). During the last 4 years, iTalkBB Chinese TV has successfully built a viewership of more than 150,000 households in the U.S. Canada (Exhibit 3 TV Viewer Density Map).  
As a member of the IGC big family, iTalkBB Media manages all advertising services on iTalkBB Chinese TV. Working closely with TV content management team, iTalkBB Media is dedicated to helping clients agencies establish an engaging relationship between brands the Chinese community in North America:Working with agencies/clients is an ever evolving process. iTalkBB Media is working on constantly enhancing our media services optimizing our solutions, including but not limited to new ad product development, data collection integration, creative approaches.


效果评估:


iTalkBB Media developed its own advertising delivery management platform, which allows advertisement to be embedded into the network, yet still independent from content streaming. The platform not only enables geo-targeted ads, but also allows a certain level of program-related campaigns. Comparing to traditional TV spot ads, iTalkBB Media advertising solutions are more relevant cost-efficient:

? Geo-targeting Advertising: Ads ed in iTalkBB Chinese TV network can target viewers locally, regionally, (inter-)nationally, resulting in largely increasing the accuracy efficiency; Compared with traditional media, such as local newspaper, radio, TV stations, iTalkBB Media can cover the Chinese-descent audiences nationwide even in Canada, without the geographic limitation;

? Fully Engaged Ad Views: Ads will be immediately ed in iTalkBB Chinese TV network before the viewer ed content. Ads cannot be skipped fast-forwarded. This particular attentioncatching spot is more likely to engage viewers deliver the message smoothly without disruption;

? Trackable Campaign Effect: Auto-generated ad delivery reports provide placement metrics for advertisers to track measure the ad effects. 
It is quite often that clients are stuck by small issues preventing a smooth launch. We have been jumping in to adjust the situations, ensuring a smooth operation without jeopardizing brand image brand message of any client.

? Product Optimization: During our first year of operations, our products were limited to 30-second video, corner graphic, banner ad. Due to increasing request from clients with support of our IT team, we progress to develop a range of products such as 15-second video, 7-second teaser, branded slate, rotational corner graphics where preferred. Clients are satisfied with the introduction of the new products catering to their different needs circumstances.

? Creative Solutions: We always think innovatively find the most workable solutions to advertisers’ problems. A national auto group had a minor detail change in the last end shot requested by the department head just an hour before deadline. As there was no incorrect information at the end shot, we suggested to launch the existing creative replace with the revised one upon completion. Client was pleased with the option provided.

? Quick Turnaround: There was another instance where the production contractor of the client was unable to deliver language adaptation voice-over within a timely manner. Our creative team took over the task, completed, received approval with a turnaround time of four days. Client was really happy as it was prior to Chinese New Year which they do not want to miss.

? Supports for realizing a bigger impact: iTalkBB Media actively leverages resources outsides of iTalkBB Chinese TV to assist agencies/advertisers in reaching out to the Chinese community in North America. This breaks down the “silo” of different channels, connects every dot in the storytelling, ultimately achieves marketing goals of the brands. An agency with a client in the FMCG industry planned for an all-around campaign targeting multi-cultural market.  They have not been successful to source for a reliable team on Chinese social media, thus seeking our help. With the help of one our social media partner, we were able to launch the campaign in time, providing over above results.