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Compare the Market makes ‘directional shift’ in first campaign from CMO Jenny Williams

Compare the Market has launched its first Australian campaign under new CMO Jenny Williams, which she said signifies a “directional shift”.

Williams – who joined the comparison website in January – told Mumbrella the campaign aims to bring the face of the company, the meerkats, closer to the brand.

“Whilst the meerkats are well recognised, people aren’t as aware of what Compare the Market actually do and to some extent they are almost seen as two seperate things.

“The goal is to embrace the brand much more and look at how those two worlds come together, so this is the first step towards creating that intersection,” Williams said.

Compare the Market’s television commercial ‘Simplesness’ features the famous Russian meerkats as they move next door to an Australian couple.

The meerkats then introduce their new neighbours to ‘Simpleness’ which they explain is a state of mind that will help people save time and money.

“If you think about the brand, ‘Simplesness’ is the tagline that the meerkats have always used and the idea was born out of the idea that as a brand our goal is to provide or simplify choice so that people can feel more empowered about making that choice,” she added.

Alongside the television commercial, Compare the Market has also created a new logo which features the meerkats.

“[The meerkats have] been the entertainment value in the marketing but what we really wanted to do was bring the meerkats much closer to the brand,” Williams added.

The campaign, created by VCCP, was based on research developed by Deloitte Access Economics which found consumers are currently overwhelmed by choice in today’s society.

“What became fairly clear is that comparators are actually contributing to the problem in the market rather than necessarily solving it, so a lot of people just feel completely overwhelmed by choice so all we do is add more choice to that.

“There is actually a lot of people who know they can save money and get a better deal but there is this inertia born out of this fear of not making the right decision,” Williams said.

Williams said the tagline and brand positioning is likely to continue throughout future campaigns.

“‘Simplesness’ is the overarching theme of the campaign and indeed one that we are trying to adopt as an organisational wide philosophy,” she added.

Jenny Williams previously oversaw the rebranding of HCF

The campaign launches on Sunday night.

Williams, who has been in the role for nine months, said her goal for the company is to develop and evolve the brand.

“It is a two pronged strategy when it comes to running a marketing team, one of those is a longer term goal which is how we develop and evolve the brand to have more meaning for consumer so they really understand what we are about both as a brand and as an organisation

“The other is obviously how we optimise what we do to deliver short term efficient results.

“Whilst we are calling this a ‘campaign’ and there is indeed an ad it is more of a directional shift and it is not a complete transformation but it is an alignment of all of our assets to work more intelligently for the business.”

VCCP credits:

  • Creative Director: Matt Lloyd
  • Creative team: Chris Willis and Jade Sturman
  • Account Director: Edward Hughes
  • Account Manager: Daniel Wood
  • Agency Producer: Sue Hind
  • Passion Pictures:
  • Director: Dave Scanlon
  • CTM credits
  • CMO: Jenny Williams
  • Communications Manager: James Boshier
  • Brand & Campaign Specialist: Carolina Perez Rebolledo
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