Kurl-on

Client
Kurl-on

Services
TVCs
Print
Social Media

An insight that awakened an entire campaign

Insights are the cornerstone to campaign building. In a single thought, can lie the power to change the fortunes of a brand forever. Insights are always there; the task lies in digging around enough to unearth them. Perfectly summarised in a quote attributed to Michelangelo: ‘The idea is already there within the block. All you have to do is remove the excess stone.’

Water Communications was tasked with handling the Kurl-on brand – a leading name in mattresses. We dug around and came up with this insight: The human mind links health primarily to food and eating healthy. And so, people equate good health with dietary habits… everything else is secondary. And yet, the truism is that sleep is the most important aspect to human health. From it does everything else follow.

On an average, we spend a third of our life in bed (8 hours in every 24-hour cycle). If this sleep cycle gets disrupted, there is a domino effect on the rest of our wellbeing and timelines. In addition to being cranky and moody through the day, a lack of sleep also affects our physiology. We start to eat the wrong kinds of food at the wrong time, which can throw our metabolism out of whack.

Slice of life. slice of hard-sell.

Film allowed us to do much more in every direction – entertain, inform and hard-sell. However, we made sure we stayed within the overall campaign thought of ‘Sleep Healthy’. The basic hook of the ad was the New Year resolution that the young couple made to stay healthy through the year. The wife resolves that they will keep healthy by exercising religiously every single day – and then eating light and healthy too.

The inflection point comes when the husband asks about what they’ll do at night. Confused, the wife says there is not need to exercise at night. Which is followed by the clincher – the Kurl-on mattresses that the husband ordered and which has just arrived.

In a happy, pleasant, slice-of-life situation, we conveyed the campaign truth that to complete the cycle of health, a peaceful and comfortable eight hours of sleep is necessary every night. The mix of benefits and hard-sell was pleasantly couched in a warm and relatable storyline.

A bit more hard-sell

Given the fact that buying a mattress is not an impulse decision, but something the family gives plenty of thought too, we suggested putting out ads in mainline and regional publications. This mix included The Times of India, Hindustan Times, The Hindu, Malayalam Manorama, and regional newspapers like Dainik Bhaskar, Dainik Jagran, Maharashtra Times, Mumbai Mirror and Mid-Day.

For the most part, these print ads carried a lot more seriousness and sophistication than their Social counterparts – with a greater emphasis on benefits, lifestyle and hard-sell. However, during festivals, the treatment was lighter and contextual, along the lines of the creatives we made for Social Media.

Reminder medium – 24x7x365

We felt it was important to carry the ‘Sleep Healthy’ campaign thought across every single piece of media – even something as below-the-line as a calendar. The calendar gave us an excellent opportunity to focus more on the virtues of a good night’s sleep, and hence subliminally promote the benefits of Kurl-on mattresses in achieving this goal.

There was no hard-sell in this, apart from the fly leaf; instead, each month leaf focused on one tip or reminder related to sleep – good or bad… effectively the ‘dos and don’ts’ of a good night’s rest. In a sense, it was a monthly and, by extension, daily reminder of what one should do before retiring to bed every night.

We left the reader with the thought and promise that if they followed these tips, they would reap the benefits of an entire year’s worth of good practices and thus be healthier and happier one year ahead.

On the bed and in your head.

We took forward the ‘Sleep Healthy’ concept prominently through Social Media – primarily Instagram. Given the nature of the medium, we gave it a lighter treatment. To keep the brand contextual and relevant right across the year, activity was spiked during festivals and special days such as World Sleep Day.

At times, we went offbeat by suggesting replacing the hackneyed term ‘Good night’ with ‘Sleep Healthy’. For festive occasions like Navratri, where sleep is at a premium, we attempted another play on words by saying ‘Shubh Ratri’, and then going on to highlight the benefits of a sound and restful sleep, especially during nights like Navratri when sleep gets severely curtailed.

Diwali presented us another opportunity to leverage the festive sentiment, and we ran a campaign that likened buying a Kurl-on mattress to making a wise and valuable investment for years to come.

There wasn’t a single part of the year when Kurl-on didn’t have an Instagram presence. We leveraged zodiac signs and the widespread following it has, to run a year-long campaign covering each of the zodiac signs.

In summary, we ensured constant and consistent reminder value for the Kurl-on brand right across the calendar.