COVID-19 fuelled rapid digitalisation across Malaysia, and while this encouraged widespread connection of people online, it simultaneously isolated lower-income populations who had limited access to the internet. In response, the Malaysian government launched the Jaringan Prihatin program, a financial subsidy for telecom providers to assist B40 (Bottom 40% by income) families and individuals to access broadband internet and data.

YES, a Malaysian telecommunications provider, launched their Prihatin Plan under the subsidy, offering a free smartphone and data plan to B40s to gain market share through new user acquisition. However, as the Jaringan Prihatin program was a nationwide initiative, eleven other telecom companies also had access to the same subsidy, creating an extremely competitive market. Additionally, household income information was rarely available for business use or solicited a high price tag, thus making it difficult for YES to reach B40 families and individuals accurately.

With competitors gearing up to launch Prihatin promotions at the same time, we devised a more targeted omnichannel media approach to deliver a seamless and relevant experience to the target audience. The strategy hinged on our ability to collect, analyse, and activate the first-party data from the B40 audience group.

Building YES’s first-party consumer database allowed us to test and refine our creative messaging and optimize for greater subscription performance. In addition, by inputting the behavioural signals exhibited from this group into programmatic platforms that utilize machine-learning, we were able to further expand our audience pool and lead generation for YES.

With household income unavailable, our first task was a market research project conducted through third-party resources to identify audience behavioural signals that could be leveraged to create target consumer segments. These included interest cues towards mobile-first, gadgets, and competitor brands. To narrow our targeting even further, we utilized available average income data by state to create three geographical tiers to inform our budget allocations.

With the goal to collect first-party data, we devised a two-phased campaign strategy. Phase 1 launched one month before the Prihatin subsidy was available with the objective to identify B40 audiences from our consumer segments by driving subscriptions. Phase 2 launched together with the Prihatin subsidy. With the first-party audience data and insights from Phase 1, performance optimizations were made to the campaigns to drive greater subscription uptake amongst B40 audiences. In addition, we expanded our B40 audience pool using first-party behaviour data for prospecting.

Programmatic platforms including DV360, Quantcast, S4M and Ogury, formed the key media channels. Their expansive ad inventory allowed us to gain maximum reach while simultaneously refining our targeting through automated optimization.

In Phase 1, YES created an exclusive offer for B40 audiences, launching the 40GB for B40 Plan. Applicants needed to verify their B40 status for approval, ensuring that all new subscribers were within our target group. New subscribers and traffic data were collected throughout the campaign, allowing us to make mid-campaign refinements and create lookalike audiences for broader audience prospecting.

Our targeting was enhanced in Phase 2 using audience insights from Phase 1. Budgets were reshuffled towards the regions and media channels that showed the most successful conversions. Investments in audience prospecting through lookalike audiences on programmatic and social platforms were increased further. Retargeting efforts were maximized with greater budgets and campaigns were restricted to a bottom-up approach.

The two-phased campaign strategy was a huge success in drumming buzz and interest for YES’s Prihatin Plan. Our data-driven approach secured high interest and consideration amongst B40 groups in Phase 1.

o Within 1.5 weeks of Phase 2, YES successfully attracted over 750,000 new subscribers,

o Exceeded subscription targets by 40%.

o Phase 2 activations were 56x more efficient in cost per B40 sign up, compared to Phase 1.

o By June 30th, 2021, YES acquired a total of 879K new subscribers with the average CPA dropping by 98% between Phase 1 and Phase 2.