Rural Movie Project

Western Union’s money transfer service relies on brand awareness but also brand familiarity to drive usage. Consumers need to trust Western Union to use the service.

In China a key target was people living in villages around tier 3 and 4 cities who tend to be older with lower educational attainment.

Reaching these consumers is hard because there are few targeted media options, printed materials may not be effective or understood and they are also conservative when it comes to testing new services.

The key way to earn their trust, however, is recommendation from family and friends and the communications solution was to create a family event in their villages and use the occasion to personally explain the Western Union service.

It created a tailor-made event in 95 different locations, promoted via posters, offering villagers the chance to see a relatively recent movie.

Before each screening a 10-minute video about Western Union was played with representatives on the ground also giving out leaflets and one to one explanations. The event was totally branded with Western Union yellow stools, banners, event and leaflets.

Research carried out after the event showed nearly everyone questioned said they would try Western Union products for future transfers. The activity is being expanded for 2009.