Just when you thought that every brand in the world had already launched their Christmas bonanza, and that – save our traditional Spooner Spectacular – we wouldn’t have to suffer any more, up pops the first ever festive campaign from Virgin Media.
Now, just in case you are a new reader, we have to warn you we’re not great fans; our own experience of being an “unlimited bundle customer” has been dire to say the least. As we have explained before, half the time our broadband is slower than a sloth, the landline is bombarded with scammers pretending to be from Virgin, the mobile data is regularly down and the TV costs an arm and a leg.
Still, we always believe in giving people a second chance, so we decided to give them the benefit of the doubt over the “Now That’s Christmas-ing” campaign, devised by Rapp UK, which promises 25 days of giveaways from across the Virgin family, all exclusively for Virgin Media’s customers. (What do you mean we’d drop everything for a free prize draw?)
Anyway, Virgin Media is offering customers a daily grand prize for “one lucky winner” and numerous winners for smaller prizes in the run up to Christmas. (What’s not to like, hey?)
Grand prizes include tickets for two on the new cruise line Virgin Voyages, cases of Virgin Wines for a year, stays in Richard Branson’s exclusive lodges and more. And on the 25th day it’s every prize, making it one mega pressie pot all gifted to one customer.
The campaign features drag star – apparently you can’t call them drag queens anymore – Cheryl Hole, who brings us the Christmas ‘Giftmother’ and tree topper, conjuring up and gifting the Virgin prizes every single day. The draw is exclusively for Virgin Media customers and all you need to do is enter once and you will be eligible to win on any day.
Rapp UK worked with production agency Rock Hound, and Big Buoy (naturally) for all post production. The agency’s executive creative director Al Mackie said: “Having worked across various Virgin brands previously, it was fantastic to be able to bring them all together into one campaign. By casting Cheryl Hole as Virgin Media’s Giftmother, we gave the customers that little extra, giving the brand its deserved edge, at what can be a very media cluttered time of year.”
Virgin Media brand and marketing director Cilesta Van Doorn seemed equally cock-a-hoop. She enthused: “Christmas is all about giving, so we wanted to give back to our customers and show them the love they deserve. Unlimited love. By working with the whole Virgin family, I believe we’ve managed to give our customers a truly unique experience unlike any other. We wish our customers the best of luck as they attempt to get their hands on a range of goodies.” (Bring it on sister.)
So, what is the consensus around the Decision Marketing office?
Well, ironically when we tried to watch the ad, Virgin’s broadband crashed but hey that’s hardly an unusual occurrence. Still, we battled on through Ms Hole’s whole spiel and thankfully there was no sign of a grinning Richard Branson for once.
And to be fair the prizes do at least sound marvellous – after all, what’s not to like about a year’s worth of free wine? However, six days in and we’ve still won diddly squat. Maybe, just maybe, our prize is looming, in which case this will be the campaign of the year; we’re not holding our breath though…
Decision Marketing Adometer: 6 out of ten
