High street optician and audiologist Specsavers has been awarded a Grand Prix and a Gold in the Audio & Radio category for The Misheard Version campaign, which was created by Golin, London.
To promote its audiology services, the retail chain teamed up with 1980s popstar Rick Astley to launch a re-recording of his song ‘Never Gonna Give You Up’ — this time with some of the lyrics amusingly changed to reflect how people misheard the original.
According to Golin, the song was played over 20 million times in the first eight hours of the campaign, driving a 138% increase in hearing loss searches and making hearing the UK’s number-one trending topic.
‘A brand known for vision had to cut through in the audiology space,’ Golin chief creative officer told Contagious. ‘We knew we had to subvert the conventions of fear and loss in the category to bring a new level of positivity and unexpected joy to the conversation... As communicators, our job is to remove the barriers between audiences and services, whether they be physical barriers or emotional ones.’
Audio & Radio jury president Simon Vicars, CCO at Colenso BBDO, said that when it came to picking the Grand Prix, the commercial factor was key, adding — ‘celebrate purpose... but interrogate purpose’.
‘The other thing we look for in the jury is commitment to creativity,’ said Vicars. ‘It was impressive to see a creative commitment to an idea. I could see the easy way of doing that [idea]. And they chose the hard way, and we loved it for that. And proving again that creativity is an amplifier for business results.’
