2degrees set itself a mission to make first phones fairer for Kiwi youngsters, using a grime song to deliver messages about online safety.
Kids are digital savvy – sometimes too savvy. When parents put their devices in walled gardens, Kiwi youngsters can get around them. Education efforts on internet safety fail to resonate – because, frankly, they’re dull.
And even Netsafe says hard and fast rules around phone use just don’t work.
2degrees wanted to help children getting their first phone. The company knew a campaign for tamariki needed to feel like part of everyday culture, while containing information about safety and positive phone behaviour.
“We know that tweens and teens can sniff out a commercial message a mile away, so we needed to package up content into something they’d wanted to listen to, something they felt like they’d discovered on their own,” says the 2degrees marketing team.
2degrees identified grime, one of the most popular music genres for young Kiwis, as the ideal vehicle for storytelling, thanks to its pacey BPM and lyrical style. And so Good Tings came along.
The song title came from a simple idea: when a child’s phone goes ‘ting’, how do they know if it’s a good ‘ting’
or a bad ‘ting’?
Using one of the top UK grime artists, Scrufizzer, Good Tings tells kids all they need to know about being safe online while still being an authentic grime track.
Its visual identity also happened to be part of the 2degrees brand: sticker bombing. Phone safety messages were made into stickers featuring emojis, song lyrics and hand-drawn illustrations that appeared in the music video.
2degrees says that instead of “preaching advice”, Good Tings delivers valuable safety lessons in disguise, allowing kids to engage through street culture aesthetic first.
The song was seeded on platforms where youth are most active, such as radio, YouTube, TikTok and even at Event Cinemas where a ‘Turn Off Your Phone’ message from Scrufizzer came on before family films.
“Rather than treating internet safety as dull and complicated, we took cues from the best experiences and emerging youth culture in New Zealand. We designed an experience and campaign that brought together entertainment, discovery and education to create life-lasting digital behaviours,” says the 2degrees marketing team.
The campaign was a success, with Netsafe revealing a 25% lift in people seeing conversation as a key protective action.
For 2degrees, not only did it reach 8.9 million people worldwide and 14 million digital impressions, the telco solidified itself as a leader in healthy phone use.
Judges’ comments
“A worthy winner. Insight had a strong connection to 2degrees – they recognised a real societal problem and had an authentic role to play in this space. Clear understanding of target audience demonstrated. Clever use of video to deliver the message with credibility, and enable a conversation between parent and child. Exceptional results.”
This was first published in the 2024 September-October NZ Marketing Magazine issue. Subscribe here.
