Sitting through two hours of anything normally proves a very challenging task for Communicate. But when we visited Leo Burnett’s Dubai offices to hear 15 students from the Higher Colleges of Technology (HCT) present campaigns for Kellogg’s Special K, Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank Ladies’ Banking and the World Gold Council, the time flew by. The three clients really are on Leo Burnett’s books, but this wasn’t a pitch; it was a research event, a rare chance to gain an insight into the Emirati mindset.
The students are all UAE nationals between the ages of 18 and 22. They’re part of the Faculty of Applied Communications at HCT Abu Dhabi Women’s College, and they were asked to present their own versions of campaigns for three brands as part of their final projects. One by one, the groups explained their target audience, their perception of the product, the mediums they used, and showed the creative work they scripted, filmed, photographed, or recorded on their own.
The Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank Ladies Banking team took a dull brand and created television and radio ads that made the assembled Leo Burnetters chuckle. The ads focused on the privacy and exclusivity sought by women banking with the ADIB, and the team’s radio effort (spoken in an Emirati accent) was well received – even if it did drift into predictable territory by the end (branch and service details). The group was praised for venturing into the medium, a notoriously tough nut to crack.
The Special K team was a little luckier with their assigned brand, and though the students related to the brand’s existing identity, they chose a new slogan: “Time to change.” Their TVC showed a transparent girl becoming more and more visible to her peers as she added Special K to her diet.
The importance these young Emirati women place on their friendships was beginning to emerge in the Special K campaign, but it became even clearer in the World Gold Council (WGC) campaign. The team worked on a brand – L’Or – which both Leo Burnett and Communicate assumed would be as attractive to the students as Special K was. But what transpired from the project and presentation was that 18 to 22 year old Emirati girls are not interested in gold – they consider it old fashioned. These modern young women relate gold to tradition, and only intend to buy it or wear it when they get married. So, in an effort to reach their age group, the team split their campaign to focus on two relationships: marriage, and friendship. Their ad revolved around a friendship gone sour, which is eventually rekindled with the giving of gold.
To wrap up the meeting Leo Burnett showed their own (still unreleased) television spot for L’Or to the students. The beautifully executed, styled, and shot ad – which is aimed at a pan-Arab audience – prompted one of the girls to say she felt her eyes sparkle while watching it. But overall a different consensus was reached: The ad is esthetically beautiful, but the girls just did not relate to the beautiful woman walking around her apartment all dressed up and in heels, alone, going out on the street, alone, getting into a taxi, alone.
Giving Leo Burnett the benefit of the doubt, perhaps the L’Or ad is not specifically targeted to 18-22 year olds. But the evidence of this experiment seems to confirm what many suspect: advertising agencies don’t know enough about UAE nationals, and while Emiratis may like the ads presented to them, they don’t necessarily relate to them.
Communicate left the Leo Burnett offices feeling a little more knowledgeable, and also a little guilty for not understanding better one of the cultures we operate in. Perhaps advertising for “pan-Arab audiences” should be reconsidered; this little slice of the UAE population proved that what may work for the rest of the Arab world doesn’t necessarily work for them.