BOC

''The Marketecture team has always impressed me with their flexibilty and reliability, but above all their creativity. They've often thrown me a 'curve ball' to challenge my thinking and approach. Their passion for B2B really shines through in everything they do.''

Marketing Manager, BOC

BOC is the largest provider of industrial, medical and special gases in the UK and Ireland. In the UK and Ireland BOC has been producing atmospheric gases, including oxygen, nitrogen and argon for over 120 years. Its portfolio today includes thousands of different gases and mixtures, as well as related equipment and services. Internationally BOC is a member of The Linde Group, a world leading gases and engineering company with almost 50,000 employees working in around 100 countries worldwide.

Our brief

Plant owners are under pressure to comply with the business, legal and environmental commitments of operating a refrigeration plant. BOC offers a range of unique services for the prevention, cure and emergency aspects of plant contamination, in order to keep plants running at the right temperature.

Following the ban on virgin R22 and other HCFC refrigerants in January 2010, BOC approached Marketecture to develop the next stage of a live campaign which was aiming to educate customers about a fothcoming significant change in refrigerant gas legislation. The purpose of the campaign was to provide valuable information to both contractors and plant owners regarding what they needed to do to comply with the law and the consequences of sitting back and doing nothing.

Team Marketecture Response

In both cases, a strong creative concept was required to capture interest and generate a greater awareness of the impact of the ban and also BOC’s new compliant service offering. BOC was keen to reignite their presence in the refrigeration market and wanted a unique creative proposition to convey their expertise and to grab attention alongside other rather dry competitor communications.

Marketecture put forward two conceptual propositions to:

- Position BOC as the expert voice on the forthcoming virgin R22 and other HCFC refrigerants ban.

- Create fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD) for the audience, driving them to seek advice from BOC and take the necessary course of action - buy new legally compliant gas from BOC to replace existing gas in use or stocks.

- Communicate a new refrigeration service offer 'The Zugibeast' to help customers deal with emergency situations when dealing with faulty refrigeration plant and machinery.

Introducing ‘Escape the HCFC hot water’ and the ‘Zugibeast’

The Marketecture creative team designed a campaign theme based around the proposition ‘Let us take the pressure’.  A campaign-specific microsite and supporting point of sale giveaways and posters were designed to draw customer's attention to the legislative implications during 2010. In 2011, the campaign was extended not only to continue to promote the legislative messages, but also introducing the longer term implications of compliance on the road to 2015. By creating a 'traffic light based' timeline of actions that customers should be taking during the year, the campaign helped to drive enquiries for more information and assistance to BOC.

The next challenge was to introduce the 'Zugibeast' and its capabilities to customers - selling the benefits of the machine in case of emergency sitautions arising. Named after its inventor, Kevin Zugibe the chairman of US engineering company, Hudson Technologies. The beast is available in the UK exclusively from BOC and is on a one machine mission to help plant owners and contractors keep refrigerant contaminations at bay. As the Zugibeast is a serious piece of technical kit, the Marketecture team decided to attempt to personalise the sell by introducing a literal interpretation 'Zugibeast' character. Playing on the message of prevention is better than cure, the aim of the campaign was to encourage plant owners to maintain regular servicing of their machinery in order that the Zugibeast never came knocking.

This was a risky move for BOC as this humorous furry character was a big step away from previous communications to the market. As a long standing operator in this sector, the concept needed to capture attention at the same time as being taken seriously. The concept was well received by the market, and feedback from clients stated that the beast concept was a refreshing twist on the usual collateral presented within the sector and was certainly a good talking point at exhibitions.

The results

Since BOC launched the gas2010.com site in early October 2010, the campaign has seen increased traffic to the site with over 1000 unique visits to date, 78% of which were new visits and  11% of this traffic came direct from promotional activity. Of the 1,375 page views recorded during this  period, they maintained a good bounce rate, with visits averaging 3 minutes 22 seconds.

BOC has managed to position itself as a market leader on the legislative change and has estimated a 700%+ increase in pre-campaign awareness.