Guinness Goes Mobile in Hong Kong

Hong Kong must be a mobile hotbed because it seems brands and agencies alike are really trying to reach this market. I did a post a couple of months ago called "Nike Uses Emerging Media in Hong Kong". Now we have a new brand stepping up to the mobile Hong Kong plate, Guinness.

Brands increasingly want to offer consumers a service and this mobile application does exactly that by helping rugby fans have a good time in Hong Kong:

"When 20,000 overseas rugby fans descended on Honk Kong for the 2008 Sevens tournament, official sponsor Guinness did more than rely on pitch-side branding and stadium beer tents for its PR.

The drinks giant instead developed software for mobile phones that was designed to assist foreigners as they travelled round the city, watching matches and enjoying the attractions on offer.

The Guinness Passport to Greatness was an application that could be downloaded from websites, WAP-sites and by texting an SMS shortcode, and in return offered all manner of information on the tournament, from team pools and fixtures to stadium directions and the nearest Guinness outlet.

But the selling point of the application was the Cantonese-speaking feature that allowed users to enter questions or the names of tourist hotspots and then get the phone to “speak” to locals in their native language. Passers-by could be stopped and asked, for example, where the nearest ATM was, and taxi-drivers could be played a recording of the name and address of a bar or restaurant and so deliver their passenger efficiently.

More than 100 popular phrases were pre-programmed into the phone, allowing users to do everything from order beer to chat up pretty ladies.

Users were driven to download the application via a competition to win Sevens tickets, which was spread virally online through the Hong Kong RFU and this was supported with a targeted email blast and international PR activity.

The Passport to Greatness application was downloaded thousands of times and resulted in a 30% increase in Guinness sales for the month, compared to the previous year. It also won the brand extensive free publicity."

This was all put together via brand owners Diagio along with Ogilvy.