Objectives

ME is a bank that does things differently from the ‘big four’ Australian banks – and that includes creating engaging, innovative and newsworthy April Fool’s Day ideas.

With COVID and lockdowns putting a stop to most brand April Fool’s Day pranks in 2020 and 2021, there was nervousness about playing in this space. Ultimately, after two years of ‘panxiety’, we felt Australia could use an April Fool’s Day lol (or at least a wry smile).

So, we stepped up to the plate with an innovation in ‘hands-free’ banking that addressed the hygienic concerns of Australia with a product that let customers do their everyday spending with their shoes. But not just any old shoes; we collaborated with another of Australia’s most loved brands, Volley.

Introducing VolleyPay.

Strategy and Execution

April Fool’s Day brand pranks have a very specific goal.

Traditionally ME markets a product that does not exist, so the objective is to build brand awareness.

We wanted Australia to fall in love (or stay in love) with ME. But we also wanted to market it like a real innovation to increase interest and shareability.

We were dealing with a BS-allergic target audience: 18-34-year-olds, glass-half-full Gen Z and Millennial Aussies (like ME’s existing everyday banking customers).

Firstly, we approached Volley, because without them it was just an unsexy ShoePay. And by partnering with them, the product instantly became more believable and it reinforced our brand value of supporting Australian businesses. Thankfully, they were on board.

We kicked off the campaign with a short video and ran organic and paid social across Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn and TikTok for one day only.

We also leveraged media and influencer partnerships with youth publisher Pedestrian.TV and Aussie content creators Swag On The Beat to create original, tongue-in-cheek social and blog content that was right for both our brand and target audience.

Lastly, we decked out our product page on ME’s website as the end of the funnel – and despite all those hints (and the date of April 1 itself) – people believed VolleyPay was very real.
 

Results

Almost entirely ideated and self-produced by ME’s internal agency (The Inside Job) and social team, VolleyPay was the little shoe that could. It was a low-budget brand activation that exceeded every single objective, like reaching a total of 12.7 million across social and PR in one day.

• Social
  (TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter)
  We reached 1.7 million people across our social platforms. VolleyPay also had 13.5k engagements and 168 social mentions in one day. People online were talking the talk about walking the walk in VolleyPay.
   
• PR
  With 11 million reach (no biggie, just almost half the country) and 102 media hits, including one broadcast piece (The Morning Show, Channel 7), we put the ME in media. Outside of traditional brand campaigns, VolleyPay was our biggest media darling of all time.
   
• Views
  Working to a benchmark of five thousand, we smashed expectations with 10 thousand views. We also saw a display delivery of 1412% increase and a call to action (CTA) of 0.21% (well above the 0.05% industry benchmark).
  
  But the most impressive stat? Instead of spending an average time of 10 seconds on the page, people were checking out VolleyPay for three whole minutes! That’s almost 20 times longer.
   
• REAL demand
  Customers and staff were asking, begging and demanding we make VolleyPay. This made us realise that it was the marking of a truly great innovation and a major brand moment for ME.
  
  And most importantly, we had some fun fooling people (and hope they had fun being fooled).

Media