Klarna is on a mission to shake up the Buy Now Pay Later industry in Australia, with a uniquely smoooth approach. That’s right, smoooth with an extra ‘o’!

But when COVID-19 derailed Klarna’s major ATL out-of-home launch campaign, there came a need to do something unexpected by reflecting the way its target audiences’ worlds were changing radically, with a specific focus on existing Millennial BNPL users in key categories across fashion, footwear, beauty and homewares.

The solution was an idea so smoooth, Klarna fell in love with it from day one, allocating additional budget to make it happen.

With the goal of driving brand awareness in the Klarna launch in Australia within an already busy BNPL marketplace, the campaign had to cut through with traditionally hard to reach and reticent audiences at a time when conventional media channels were being rendered ineffective by the national lockdown.

The idea hinged on pulling together Australian artists to co-create a humorous original song and music video, reflecting what was going on inside Australia’s homes during COVID-19 lockdown.

Working alongside four very different hand-picked creative influences across music and comedy, the writing process weaved together a series of lyrical skits taking people on a journey through the isolation-induced home shopping experience that resonated with an entire nation in lockdown.

Keeping pace with the changing mood of the nation, as well as drawing on real-world insights on shopping behaviour, the music video mirrored some of the strange, but shared, turns life was taking.

Combining real-world insights into people’s isolation-induced shopping behaviour, with an ethereal, other-worldly aesthetic true to Klarna’s vibrant palette, the music, lyrics and visuals created an entertaining bridge between the real, the weird and the wonderful, incorporating of-the-moment cultural references such as a nod to a Tiger King G-string!

With people’s lives and shopping habits changing daily, the challenge for Klarna was to show how a BNPL service understood exactly what Australians were going through.

Lockdowns saw online shopping surge, with visits to retail websites increasing by 80.4% in May 2020, and sales of dumbbells on eBay alone up 1,980% in April.

New to the Australian market, the campaign had to explain what Klarna was to a female skewed Millennial audience currently using BNPL services, while introducing the brand with Klarna’s trademark quirkiness and sense of humour.

But the strategy still had to tread so carefully given the risk of misjudging the national sentiment and hitting the wrong note!

With most other brands creating content during COVID-19 choosing to play it safe with their cookie-cutter “we’re all in this together” campaigns, anticipating how the mood of the nation would evolve at a time of huge instability was crucial.

Without knowing whether the nation would be coming out of lockdown when the campaign was scheduled to launch, even things like which tense to write and record in became huge creative decisions!

An experimental four-way creative collaboration with very different artists working together for the first time also didn’t offer any guarantees of success.

And then recording and filming under lockdown conditions, made things even more challenging.

With the campaign given the go ahead on 8th May the whole thing was in the can and online just seven weeks later by 25th June.

Launching on YouTube as a three-minute music video, each of the collaborating talent also created a platform-specific creative video interview series designed to amplify the campaign.

Standalone social tactics were also implemented to drive social engagement, social UGC and campaign awareness, including a new #GetWhatUReallyLove AR filter for Klarna’s Instagram and Facebook pages.

The campaign delivered HUGE results over a concentrated four-week period (25th June-21st July).

Including:

- 25m+ content video views

- 31m+ total impressions

- Total reach of 21m+.

Klarna’s brand awareness – the key campaign metric - rocketed to 33% among the primary audience, and from 0% to 23% among 18-39 year olds, while brand consideration KPIs were smashed by 5X.

We used the power of PR to spread the word and drive views, with coverage spanning The Daily Telegraph, LADbible, Pedestrian and many more reaching, an audience of more than 16 million people. domestically and internationally.

Engagement across Klarna’s social channels increased 76%, contributing to a 57% increase in social followers - a growth rate over 300%+ higher than the previous period.

The in-feed ‘Get What I Love’ Instagram content averaged +64% per post versus non-campaign content.

While CTR on video ads measured 4.5 X higher than industry benchmarks.