In both Japan and Korea, mobile gaming is crowded and well established. Which meant gamers already had their go-to habits for mobile games and that’s a hell of an uphill battle to win. Google Play wanted to not only make a splash, but actually get gamers to try new games and drive trials and downloads, vs just positive favorability.

We needed to drive action, not just impressions.

Key Idea: No better time than down time.

We wanted to focus on making downtime a space for play, vs idleness. Research had shown that this was the most optimal time to incentivize new behavior. Working with both media and creative teams, we placed a sense of urgency within our creative but also served it at just the right time to try. We specifically dayparted against things like weekday/weekend, travel times, commutes and other moments where your fingers are still but your mind may be racing. We worked with global teams to localize and make sure that we were still staying true to each culture we touched.

Results: Campaign broke industry standards on trials, resulting in its expansion to across regions and duplication to similar success.