Orcon re-records 'The Passenger' with Iggy Pop — Ad Stars 2010 Grand Prix

Orcon offered faster broadband and better customer service but was barely known in a market dominated by Telecom and Vodafone. The brief was to raise awareness, so the agency staged a major online event — in effect a mass product demonstration — and built awareness by engaging the whole country in it.

Prove broadband by using it: link nine New Zealand musicians over Skype to Iggy Pop in Miami and re-record 'The Passenger' live, online, as a mass product demonstration.

The call for auditions went first to Orcon's customers and Facebook friends, then through 15-second TVCs and street posters pointing to a specially built Facebook application; 200 audition videos arrived in ten days. Nine musicians were chosen and linked from their homes across New Zealand to Iggy Pop's Miami studio via Skype, where he coached them live and created a new arrangement, and the live session became the campaign's TV commercials.

200 video auditions in ten days, more than 100,000 audition views on Facebook, 3,500 new Orcon Facebook friends in two weeks, over NZ$650,000 of unpaid media coverage before the TV ad ran, and sales up 30% year on year. The campaign won the Direct Grand Prix at Cannes Lions 2010 and the Grand Prix at Ad Stars 2010 in Busan.

In 2009 Orcon, a small New Zealand internet provider, offered faster broadband and better customer service than Telecom and Vodafone — but almost nobody knew it. Special Group's answer was not another ad about speed: make the campaign itself run on the network. The agency pitched the idea of bringing punk legend Iggy Pop to New Zealand virtually, to re-record his 1977 song 'The Passenger' with nine ordinary Kiwi musicians.

The call for auditions went out first to Orcon's customer base and Facebook friends, then through 15-second TVCs and street posters pointing to a specially built Facebook application where entrants uploaded videos from home. Two hundred audition videos arrived in ten days and were viewed more than 100,000 times. Nine musicians were chosen and, from their living rooms across New Zealand, were linked by Skype to Iggy Pop in his Miami studio, where he coached them live and orchestrated a brand-new arrangement.

The live session and its behind-the-scenes story became TV commercials and global news: 3,500 new Orcon Facebook friends in two weeks, more than NZ$650,000 of unpaid media coverage before the TV ad had even run, and sales up 30% on the previous year. The campaign took the Direct Grand Prix at Cannes Lions 2010 and the Grand Prix at Ad Stars in Busan, and remains a textbook case of the product demonstration as the campaign itself.

The proof was the product: the stunt could only happen on fast, reliable broadband, so the event was evidence rather than a claim.

It turned customers into participants — auditions and the live session ran through Facebook and Skype, so engagement was built into the idea itself.

The world-first frame made the news write itself: NZ$650,000 of earned coverage arrived before paid TV even aired.

A small budget beat bigger spenders by making one audacious event instead of trying to out-buy them.

When the product is invisible, make the campaign the demonstration: the event ran on Orcon's own broadband, so the stunt was the proof — and earned coverage worth more than the paid media.

The campaign put Orcon on the map and made Special Group an international name: it won the Direct Grand Prix at Cannes Lions 2010 and the Grand Prix at Ad Stars in Busan, took Effie awards for effectiveness, and was covered by CNN and Vanity Fair. Special Group says the campaign generated more than NZ$1 million of PR coverage and was even congratulated in the New Zealand Parliament. The agency, which had opened its doors only 18 months earlier, built its reputation on the work, and 'Together Incredible' has been cited ever since as a model of using the product itself as the medium.