ABOUT

HSBC has faced strong reputational issues and, for the first time since 2008, is no longer #1 bank in the Kantar Brand Asset Valuator (BAV) index, having fallen out of the top 100. Meaningful brand differentiation has become a business imperative.

In 2021, HSBC had a new brand purpose – opening up a world of opportunity – but it meant nothing to its audience. We had to make it real. To do this, we looked at the bank’s partnerships to use sport as a canvas to paint a positive picture of the brand and its values – driving positive sentiment and engagement.

CONCEPT
Our starting point was HSBC’s ‘Internationalist’ audience. Representing a broad behavioural group of people globally who share values of internationalism and open-mindedness, we took the information we had to build an audience profile on GWI. Using this profile, alongside industry and cultural insights, we built a game-changing insights document which was lauded by the client.

Leading us to four key insight drivers to inform our strategy:

- Create a narrative that connects to the powerful values we share with the audience
- Focus on an individual/human voice to drive authenticity
- Tell unknown and powerful stories, not being afraid to embrace long-form storytelling
- Be an enabler for athletes as individuals

We created the ‘Tell Your Story’ HSBC brand partnerships strategy, built on telling powerful stories, through the voice of the athlete, that connected to the brand’s values.

One of sport’s major issues is its lack of equality between men and women, which goes well beyond just players. Danielle ‘Nolli’ Waterman has experienced first-hand the barriers faced by women within her sporting career, whether as a player, coach or commentator. She has faced torrents of abuse as a commentator whenever she has commented on men’s games. We wanted to give her a chance to fight back and speak out on these issues in her own words.

EXECUTION
We put the HSBC brand in Danielle’s hands, asking her to tell her own powerful story. We created the idea, and then approached a talented female director in the sports industry, and Nolli’s podcast partner, Laura-Jane Jones, to create a short documentary. We then managed the shoot itself, developed the publishing strategy and delivered the results.

“Finding Her Voice” brought to life HSBC’s brand purpose of opening up a world of opportunity, while shining a light on the abuse that the Rugby World Cup winner faced as a commentator, and her battle against discrimination.

The content was made to be raw and emotional to deliver our core themes. In line with the strategy, our priority was to position Nolli as the storyteller, so we used powerful close crops to make it clear this was her story. We avoided HSBC talking heads, interviewing genuine friends of Nolli who could help her tell her story.

The main film lives on the HSBC Global YouTube and Facebook channels. In addition, a selection of cut down clips were created for HSBC Sport Instagram and Twitter channels to support the main film and drive viewers to YouTube.

Crucially, our approach was built to an make impact across all channels – not just through our owned social media feeds. Our publishing strategy focused on producing content that drove fame across all channels, including:

Owned: A detailed publishing plan for the HSBC_Sport channels and toolkit distributed to HSBC local markets and global brand channels - with huge success in delivering cut-through globally, a key metric of success for the client.

Earned: To secure more in-depth articles ahead of launch, we pitched embargoed interviews with Nolli and LJ into key titles across rugby, sport and women's lifestyle press. We secured interviews in 4 different media publications, including a broadcast interview with BBC Sportsday.

Shared: We delivered detailed toolkits for our partners, including rights holders and ambassadors. This was hugely successful, with all HSBC rugby ambassadors posting across all their social media platforms, in addition to a substantial level of athlete, commentator and public support across social.

Paid: A paid strategy across YouTube and Facebook kicked in at launch. The majority of the spend was on YouTube due to its scale and ability to tap into a wide audience with a range of targeting options. We used one of the 30 second cut down clips as a skippable pre-roll ad optimised to drive views of the long-form content while creating a lot of free brand exposure as a secondary objective/outcome.

There were no pre-planned lines here. No HSBC talking head invited for comment. This was about telling a genuine human story. A story that fans wanted to watch, and media wanted to cover – a world away from traditional HSBC comms.

But a story that created a clear association between the platform that brought it to the world (HSBC) and values of gender equality, opportunity and the struggles that come from changing profession.

And we didn’t stop at storytelling, creating a new programme to help young people get into the world of sport.

RESULTS
The campaign resonated across channels, driving powerful sentiment uplift, reaching key audiences through the channels where we know they spend their time, and inspiring massive engagement with the brand:

733 pieces of earned coverage, with highlights including BBC Sportsday (broadcast), Daily Telegraph (online and print), Sky Sports, the I (print)

The total reach of coverage to date is 666 million, which includes consumer titles such as Fabulous Magazine, which conducted interviews with Nolli after the launch of the film.

On social media, we delivered 1m views and 4.5m impressions, with an impressive 20% view rate.

This campaign made a demonstratable impact in driving positive brand reputation impact for HSBC. It delivered a significant uplift in brand sentiment, contributing to a 45% increase year-on-year in positive mentions on HSBC Sport social media channels – evidenced by supportive comments discussing HSBC in the context of this powerful story of female empowerment. This, alongside the coverage generated for HSBC in new media titles and channels – which put a positive brand story in front of new audiences – moved the needle in terms of creating meaningful differentiation between HSBC and their competitors.

Finding Her Voice also inspired HSBC to set up a new grassroots programme titled World of Opportunity, which is aimed to help young boys and girls realise the opportunities available to them within sport and beyond being a player, such as a role within the media, coaching, filming and medical support. This was launched in December 2021.