Ideas We Love: Skinny Mobile. Low-Cost Liz 🤖
Issue Number 47: NZ Telco Skinny Mobile use A.I. to build the ultimate low-cost advertising ambassador
Hi there. How are you all?
We wish a very warm welcome to new readers who’ve subscribed recently as well as a big thank-you to all the suggestions that came in off the back of our Shelf Help Guide last week. There is a follow up in the works where we’ll be collating a number of the suggestions we’ve received into a part two.
In the meantime, normal service resumes and this week’s issue is a love-letter to an idea all the way from the other side of the world. One that has leant fully into Generative AI wizardy. Not just because it can, but because it’s the perfect tool to dramatise the brand’s promise and market positioning.
The Idea: Low-Cost Mobile 🤝 Low-Cost Advertising
For those of you who aren’t familiar with Skinny Mobile, they’re a low-cost Telco provider in New Zealand.
Colenso BBDO have created a gift that keeps on giving, with a brand idea built that revolves all around making low-cost advertising campaigns in tune with their low-cost positioning.
The breakthrough work around this idea was their Phone It In campaign, which saw the brand create novel 2-way media formats, using long-copy ads that doubled as scripts for customers to voice Skinny’s radio ads via a voice mail service. These ads were then played out across national radio. Lovely.
Now we’ve just seen a new round of work playing out where Skinny have turned to A.I. to transform a super-fan of the brand into what Simon Vicars, CCO of Colenso has coined as “The Terminator 2 of brand ambassadors; a low-cost advertising machine.” It’s time to meet Low-Cost Liz.
Why we Love it 💕
#1. A long-idea, given fresh legs 🏃♂️
Ad-Effectiveness research outfit System 1 talk about “compound creativity” which sees work get more effective over time as it becomes more commonly understood.
One route to compounding effects is just to keep running the same ads (if they’re “effective ones obvs”).
The more lucrative, but more challenging route to fortune is via fame-building work that has a consistent out-take, but brings fresh stimulus that adds more layers of meaning over time. Specsavers & Snickers would be great examples of brands who’ve achieved this.
Skinny’s core proposition is low prices, and “low-cost advertising” is an embodiment of that truth Colenso are flexing in imaginative ways.
#2. An ‘Earned First’ Approach, Amplified by Paid 🎙️
Good comms planners try to sweat all avenues to reach and resonance; not all of which start or end with paid media.
One reason we like this iteration of Low-Cost Advertising is the recruitment phase to find Liz, which when combined with a newsworthy hook of using A.I to clone her and give her superpowers, ensured coverage across media outlets that inevitably spread wider and wider, making the brand famous in the process. An approach proven time and again to improve all the outcomes that matter…
…as this type of fame primes people to take notice once any scaled efforts via paid in more scaled advertising spaces kick in.
#3. Zagging vs. Creator & Celebrity Fatigue 💁♂️
Many brands chase expensive influencers or celebrities to game attention and association; Skinny flips the model on its head here by celebrating real customers instead. In doing so this choice aligns to their challenger positioning as a brand that outsmarts rather than outspends; signalling that they’re in-tune with some of the pop-cultural fatigue around the influencerisation of the modern media ecosystem.
#4. AI applied with purpose 👾
In IWL#36, Guest Editor Andrew Mclean talked about ‘choice as a superpower’ where AI is concerned. There are plenty of brands facing a backlash for the application of Gen AI to their creative work (Coke comes to mind). We’re not passing judgement. The tools are here, we should think about their use. No-one minds that Compare the Market doesnt use real meerkats, do they?
However, the technology is central to this idea. It’s all about low-costs. It’s all about endless variations of the central brand ambassador. Gen AI not only makes sense here but makes the idea possible.
What we’d love to do with it 💕
In this part of the newsletter we typically cosplay comms planners for the idea we’ve featured. So here’s a few ways Skinny might take Low-Cost Liz into the wild in ways that would make us smile.
#1. Contextual Chameleon
We’ve only seen the beginnings of this idea, but with a ‘Terminator’ like Liz in-tow you can see plenty of playful potential to dial-up the power of context and make her responsive to her surroundings.
Imagine her riffing off a competing telco’s ad in the next ad break, throwing shade at their prices…. Or tweaking her tone to match the moment, dropping rugby related banter during the halftime break of an All Blacks test or keeping it straight for News.
Liz isn’t just in the ad-break, she’s able to play a leading role within it.
#2 Money Shaving Expert
For many Brits, Martin Lewis has become a bit of a national institution. He started by helping us save money on credit cards and mortgages but now regularly seeks to hold power to account as the cost of living crisis continues.
What if Low-Cost Liz became New Zealand’s answer to Martin Lewis? Albeit with a Skinny twist? A no-nonsense, money-saving guru dishing out tips not just on phone plans, but on everyday life. From stretching your supermarket budget to hacking your power bill, Liz could front bite-sized content across social, radio, and OOH, proving that being smart with money doesn’t have to start and stop with your mobile.
Playful, practical, and always on-brand, she’d reinforce Skinny’s value promise in a way that’s as entertaining as it is useful.
#3 Skinny Dupes
Luxury ‘Dupes’ seem to be in the news alot at the moment. Liz could be used to front a range of exclusive, low-cost versions of high-end products and experiences, made available only to Skinny customers.
Anyone else getting bombarded by these on Instagram at the moment?
Each week, Liz drops a new dupe, proving that you don’t need to spend big to live large. Think budget-friendly getaways to stunning local spots instead of pricey overseas holidays, top-tier dining experiences at a fraction of the cost, or premium fitness classes swapped for smart, low-cost alternatives. This could manifest itself in the form of a customer incentive programme ala O2 Priority….
Delivered through social, scaled through selective broadcast (as you would launching any NPD) you can create a drumbeat of real, newsworthy, tangible perks that make life feel richer without the rich price tag.
Keeping customers loyal for longer in the process.
If you like this, then you’ll love…. 💕
Curious about how other brands have dabbled with A.I. to engage, not just automate?Here’s some examples for you.
Orange Mobile’s Ballers ⚽️
Here Gen AI applied to make a serious point about the way we watch and ‘value’ sport… using footage of French Women’s football disguised as the male team’s games to make the point about the parity of the product….
O2’s Scambaiter 👵
There is a lot of concern about how GenAI will be used to scam people out of money. Here, the tables are turned and the hunters become the hunted…. O2 creating an AI tool to waste scammers time when they call.
Messi Messages by Lay’s 🇦🇷
Turn Lionel Messi into your own messenger with this tongue in cheek use of AI….
UberEats’ Aussie Open Takeover 🎾
We’re suckers for contextual ideas. And this one is ace… smashing…. etc
Until Next Time 💕
As always, thanks for stopping by.
Until next time, Cheerio.
Matt & Tom x