Title	KONE VR ESCALATOR THE MOST UNEVENTFUL VR EXPERIENCE EVER MADE
Brand	KONE OYJ
Product/Service	KONE 24/7 CONNECTED SERVICES FOR ESCALATORS
Category	C03. Exhibitions / Installations
Entrant	HASAN & PARTNERS Helsinki, FINLAND
Idea Creation	HASAN & PARTNERS Helsinki, FINLAND
Idea Creation 2	KONE Espoo, FINLAND
Media Placement	SPOON Helsinki, FINLAND
Media Placement 2	TRICKLE DISTRIBUTION Stockholm, SWEDEN
Production	MAKE FILMS Helsinki, FINLAND
Production 2	INTO DIGITAL Helsinki, FINLAND

Name	Company	Position
Tobias Wacker	hasan & partners Oy	Creative director
Timo Huopalainen	hasan & partners Oy	Senior creative, art director
Niclas Runeberg	hasan & partners Oy	Creative, copywriter
Rasmus Stoltzenberg	hasan & partners Oy	Senior Creative, Copywriter
Dean Clatworthy	hasan & partners Oy	Lead developer
Marc Stevenson	hasan & partners Oy	Executive producer
Karin Gellman	hasan & partners Oy	Production AD
Christopher Keravuori	hasan & partners Oy	Producer
Markus Frick	hasan & partners Oy	Account manager
Mia Sirkiä	hasan & partners Oy	Head of B to B
Ketsia Anttila	hasan & partners Oy	Account manager
Max Alfthan	KONE Oyj	Executive Vice President, Marketing and Communication
Anna-Kaisa Ehnqvist	KONE Oyj	Marketing Communications Manager
Laura Vinha	KONE Oyj	Managing editor
Scott McMahon	KONE Oyj	Communications Manager and Writer
Suvi Silvanto	KONE Oyj	Marketing Communications Director
Liisa Kivelä	KONE Oyj	Director Communications
Leandro Righini	Make Films	VR Director and Producer
Aki Silventoinen	Make Films	Sound Designer
Tommi Lehtonen	Make Films	VFX & VR Supervisor, UnitC
Antti Rasi	Into-Digital	Managing director
Antti Lassila	Into-Digital	Head developer
Lena Barner-Rasmussen	Spoon Publishing Oy	Agency Director
Asha Gopalkrishnan	Spoon Publishing Oy	Content director
Nikhil Sivadas	Spoon Publishing Oy	Editor
David Larsson	Trickle Distribution	Creative & distribution director

Why is this work relevant for Brand Experience & Activation ?

By creating an immersive VR-experience, KONE was able to connect with the audience in a manner completely new to the company. The message; KONE’s 24/7 Connected Service makes escalators run without interruptions, was communicated in a surprising, effective way. In a world of fast-paced content and short attention spans, KONE managed to differentiate and stand out by presenting something utterly uneventful in an impressive, thoughtful way. ”Like those weird Norwegian Netflix films where you ride a train for ten hours, it’s actually entrancing.” -Matthew Huges, The Next Web

Background

As the construction market is slowing down globally, KONE has increasingly shifted their focus from new equipment business towards services. Digitalization is changing elevator and escalator maintenance and many of KONE’s competitors has launched new services within this area of business. KONE wanted to launch their IoT-service in a way that clearly stands out and create a competitive edge. The 24/7 Connected Services combines KONE equipment with IBM’s Watson-platform, which analyses escalator activity in real-time, every second of every day. Continuous monitoring helps KONE make timely service and maintenance procedures, which prevents unnecessary breakage. KONE had previously informed about the collaboration with IBM Watson at a press conference, that did not generate the sought-after media attention. In 2017 KONE launched their connected services for elevators, under the title Machine Conversations, to great success. In 2018 it was time for escalators to become connected.

Describe the creative idea

We did not want to replicate or widen our previous Machine Conversations campaign, as the news value and potential to generate earned media would have been next to zero. Escalators are boring by design, even to the target groups. They only get noticed when they break down. This means that we make them even more uneventful by monitoring them in order to keep them running without interruption. How do you market something that is innovative, but essentially boring? Our solution was to bring something fresh, news worthy and innovative to the method of storytelling itself, while making it so boring it becomes captivating. Because escalators that run without interruptions are essentially boring, we created the world’s most boring VR-experience.

Describe the strategy

Bought, traditional media would not have been a resource efficient method to reach our goals. Generating earned media space through an interesting idea, social media and PR - and strengthening KONE’s position as an innovation leader at the same time - proved to be a smarter option. Bought media was only utilized in social media. Most of the gathered attention was generated by carefully planned PR-actions and activity within social media channels. The campaign exceeded our goals and gathered 42.8M potential viewers, even though it was, well, the most boring VR-experience ever created.

Describe the execution

By connecting their escalators to IBM Watson’s Cloud Services, KONE can monitor their performance, surroundings and status in real-time. This enables predictive, tailored and intelligent maintenance. When escalators are serviced before breakage, KONE can keep them running without interruptions, almost endlessly. We wanted to honor the service with a campaign, true to its innovative nature. By creating an escalator ride in virtual reality, we managed to achieve probably the most uneventful VR-experience in the world. The never-ending ride is only accompanied by the monotone voice of the escalator, which informs the user about its performance. The audience got to enjoy the holistic VR-experience at exhibitions, show-rooms and downtown malls - while standing on a mini-escalator. We also made the experience accessible through phone-enabled VR-goggles and as a 360°-video on the campaign site: machineconversations.kone.com/escalators. We also expanded the story through a demonstrative product video, press-kit and making-off material.

List the results

With the campaign, our goal was to a) raise awareness around KONE’s Connected Services globally, b) communicate that escalators are now included in the service offering, and c) strengthen KONE’s position as a innovation leader. The campaign’s results were measured from February 28th 2018 to March 20th 2018. Results: ? 164 media hits (not social media) ? 42.8M potential audience reach ? 3.6M Social Media contacts ? 19,884 website visits (exceeded the set goal levels, low: 6000, average: 12.500, high: 17.200) ? Active dialog between CEO’s on Twitter, Henrik Ehrnrooth (KONE) and Marc Benioff (Salesforce). The marketing has also helped KONE to reach the position of 59th most innovative company globally and 7th most innovative company in Europe, according to Forbes.