Title	MARRIAGE MARKET TAKEOVER
Brand	SK-II
Product/Service	SKINCARE
Category	A07. Corporate Image & Sponsorship
Entrant	FORSMAN & BODENFORS Gothenburg, SWEDEN
Idea Creation	FORSMAN & BODENFORS Gothenburg, SWEDEN
Media Placement	BE ON Copenhagen, DENMARK
PR	BE ON Copenhagen, DENMARK
Production	TOOL Los Angeles, USA

Name	Company	Position
Susanna Fagring	FORSMAN & BODENFORS	Account Supervisor
Linda Tiderman	FORSMAN & BODENFORS	Account Manager
Sophia Lindholm, Karina Ullensvang	FORSMAN & BODENFORS	ART DIRECTOR
Tove Eriksen Hillblom	FORSMAN & BODENFORS	Copywriter
Amat Levin	FORSMAN & BODENFORS	PR-strategist
Christian Sundén	FORSMAN & BODENFORS	Designer
My Troedsson	FORSMAN & BODENFORS	PLANNER
Alexander Blidner (film), Peter Gaudiano (digital)	FORSMAN & BODENFORS	Agency Producer, Film/Digital
Joey Chung (freelance)	FREELANCE	Chinese writer
Cut n Run	Cut n Run	Postproduction
Be On / AOL Platforms	Be On / AOL Platforms	Client Lead: Jakob Stigler, Head of Planning & Strategy: Thor Otar Nielsen
Floyd Russ	TOOL	DIRECTOR
Mary Church	TOOL	PRODUCER
Victor Magro	Future Perfect Music	MUSIC
Robert Helphand	TOOL	Exec producer
Jacob Moller	TOOL	D.O.P
Robert Ryang	TOOL	EDITOR
Cut n Run	Cut n Run	SOUND

The Campaign

We wanted to give a voice to women under pressure to marry and find a symbolic way for them to make a statement. The marriage market is a place where the pressure materializes in physical form. It seemed fitting that the women would stand their ground there. We built an installation and replaced the dating ads with personalized messages from single women, proclaiming that they’re happy being independent, contrary to the image being portrayed by media. To spread the story we shot a documentary with four single women and their parents. We used real women and not actors, making it easier for the target audience to relate. Many women feel alone in facing this pressure and by using real women we could combat that notion. The film was created as a tool that people could use to raise awareness.

Creative Execution

Everything centered around an installation at the marriage market in Shanghai’s People’s Park, where we replaced dating ads with statements from single women, proclaiming that they’re happy being independent and won’t marry just to please someone else. We then shot a documentary style film with four of the women and their parents. The film was created as a tool that people could use to raise awareness. After all, it’s easier sharing a film than to start a debate on your own, especially with this taboo subject matter. The film was premiered on Chinese video hosting sites Youku, Tencent as well as YouTube. Supporting the launch was Chinese and international influencers who shared the film and helped spread the word on blogs, Twitter and Chinese microblogging site Weibo. We then launched Behind the Scenes interviews with the women, providing an even greater insight into the nuances of China’s views on marriage.

Results

So far, the film has over 44 million views around the globe, showing the universal appeal of the message. Over 2000 editorial pieces and been featured in everything from Forbes, BBC and CNN to Buzzfeed, Mashable, Huffington Post and Elle generating a total reach of over 4 billion. The story has spread to 55 countries on all continents and proved to be a huge success in China, where it became the first ever to make the top ten trend list on the 650 million users strong Weibo. It has also been featured on news channels, with over 7 million social actions as a result and SK-II’s YouTube subscribers have more than doubled. Most importantly, thousands of social media posts from women talking about how the campaign has had a real effect. We created so much buzz that the state-owned media promoting the Sheng Nu term couldn’t ignore addressing the campaign.

This is a campaign that raises an important problem that is kept under wraps in China and that the rest of the world has hardly heard of. We took over a marriage market in Shanghai’s People’s Park and created an installation that was both beautiful and thought provoking. We then recorded the reactions of the visitors and created a film to spread through a number of Chinese and international digital platforms. We made sure to spread the film through Weibo, an important platform for the target audience in China.

The PR and media strategy was formed together with the creative idea. Using our knowledge of the Chinese audience, we utilized influencers to spread our message. In China, word of mouth is integral as 48 percent aren’t likely to view branded content unless it comes from a trusted circle. To drive engagement and create momentum we also decided to take an inside out/outside in approach, meaning that the outside world had to be made aware of the Sheng Nu issue and that the people of China had to be made aware that the outside world had taken notice. We wanted to avoid demonizing Chinese culture, instead raising an important topic and using it to kick-start discussions on every continent, as pressure being put on women is a universal problem.