Hibiki Whisky: 24 Moments of Harmony

Challenge

On the back of a successful partnership in 2023 with The House of Suntory, this time around we were entrusted to develop global awareness of Hibiki Whisky, elevating the brand beyond whisky enthusiasts and establish it as a globally recognized symbol of luxury craftsmanship that transcends the global whisky market.

In addition to increased awareness, success required driving desirability across priority markets while redefining what Hibiki represents. The ambition was to transform Hibiki from a premium product into a true cultural authority within the global luxury lifestyle space.

Strategic Solution

Modern luxury consumers place a greater emphasis on a brand’s cultural heritage, rather than its status. This insight was the key to the campaign’s strategy – reposition Hibiki from a product to a sensory experience of Japanese culture. Immerse the key audience within an environment that pays homage to the very ideologies of Japanese culture which have defined Hibiki since it’s inception – Harmony, Nature, Artistry, Craftsmanship, Tradition, and Omotenashi.

Brand:

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A crucial element of the strategy was to tailor the content around the 24 facets of Hibiki’s bottle, through 24 immersive chapters within which users could experience these brand pillars of Hibiki, rather than simply read about them. Each chapter would provide a window into the role Hibiki plays in elevating the experience of Japanese Whisky – truly, 24 Moments of Harmony.

To anchor this strategy, we developed a first-of-it’s kind, premium interactive content hub. The page was carefully considered to achieve a luxurious space for the audience to explore at their own pace and spend increased time with Hibiki.

Users would arrive at the page via premium, targeted media placements across the Business Insider ecosystem – onsite, social, and vertical video.

In order to deliver a truly complete strategy, high impact onsite placements featuring custom content provided the audience with the chance to continue their experience with Hibiki, across global e-commerce platforms to enhance purchase intent.

Content Solution

Creatively, the objective required us to position Hibiki as the pinnacle of modern harmony by shining a light on the brand’s reflection of Japan’s tacit respect for a balance of nature, tradition, and craftsmanship.

To develop luxurious content which captured an emotional response from the audience, we had to encapsulate three key pillars to underpin the narrative – Japan’s landscape, Hibiki’s heritage, and the precision that goes into Hibiki’s blend.

It was from these pillars which we identified the six core chapters for the content – Harmony, Nature, Artistry, Craftsmanship, Tradition, and Omotenashi. Within each chapter, six moments were selected to embody how Hibiki balances innovation and tradition, such as washi art and woodcarving; onsens and the cultural heritage of the converging three rivers.

A four-day shoot on the ground in Japan provided the opportunity to capture content across 13 locations. Places connected with Hibiki included The Bar at the Ritz Carlton, Tokyo, Washi artist Eriko Horiki’s studio, Suntory Hall, and naturally the Yamazaki distillery where Hibiki is produced. Premium video and imagery were supplemented with high-profile interviews with Eriko Horiki, who’s washi labels enwrap the Hibiki bottle, and Fifth Chief Blender, Shinji Fukuyo.

Throughout production, there was careful consideration befitting of Fukuyo’s craftsmanship. The site presented users with a horizontal scroll through Hibiki’s story, with engaging transitions inspiring the audience to continue their exploration into the brand. Subtle instances of colour, light, and sound would mimic the flowing water and rustling leaves of Japan’s nature, the varying colour palette that arrives with each passing micro-season that Hibiki’s bottle credits. Every moment of the journey was deliberate in shaping the user’s perspective of how Japanese culture and Hibiki’s blend are intertwined.

Ultimately, the content solution provided a unique, elevated experience within which beautiful, engaging storytelling gave the user a basis to explore how Hibiki is a quintessential brand rooted in Japanese tradition.

Media/Content Amplification Solution

Given the appeal of Business Insider to the key Hibiki audience, they were the ideal partner to assist in bringing Hibiki’s story to a global set of HNWIs with a passion point for both whisky and culture.

Through developing custom content as a microsite, we could tailor the build to encourage users to spend increased time with the brand. An array of onsite and offsite placements enabled us to deliver qualified reach and engagement from the key audience. Premium positions leveraged both audience targeted and high impact units on Business Insider’s website in the US, UK, Germany, Singapore, and Australia – all key target markets for Hibiki.

Onsite media included native ads to seamlessly integrate Hibiki within the audience’s daily consumption of BI content, driving through to the interactive experience. Initially, we ran six separate creatives with each driving to one of the six chapters within the interactive experience. Through consistent moderation during the flight, we seamlessly optimised the strategy in accordance with user behaviour to have all six creatives drive to the beginning of the interactive. Mid-flight performance revealed that users who completed chapter 1 were 2.5x more likely to engage for longer than users landing midway through the page. Following this, we saw a noticeable increase in the time spent with Hibiki.

Across BI social channels, we distributed three custom vertical videos across Instagram and YouTube Shorts. This approach allowed us to bring about greater visibility and engagement of the luxury content that was created and give the audience a wider platform to explore Hibiki outside of the BI.com environment.

To facilitate a full circle strategy, custom Fullscape, Marquee, and banners featured campaign imagery to give users the opportunity to purchase Hibiki themselves, enhancing purchase intent as well as increased brand consideration.

This rounded, considered strategy provided the basis for success, enabling us to deliver increased content engagement, awareness, and consideration from the Hibiki target audience within key territories.

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Avwerage time spent on the site, 230% over the BI benchmark for content engagement.

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Above KPIs on content page-views, native ad click through was 93% above benchmark.

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Increase in unaided brand recall, and a 2.7x lift for purchasing intent.

Results

Across the board, the campaign saw standout results against Hibiki’s objectives for awareness, engagement, and purchase intent.

A key indicator of success was the unprecedented 5:01mins average time spent by the audience interacting with the page, which was over 230% of the BI benchmark for content engagement. The considered strategy was integral to delivering an environment which promoted such strong user engagement.

With regard to media delivery, there was a distinct trend of over-delivery against pre-flight guarantees. Content pageviews delivered to 109% of its KPI, Native ad click through was 93% above benchmark, and vertical video saw 106% delivery against guaranteed views with completion rates exceeding internal BI benchmarks.

Mid-flight optimisations enhanced performance by enabling users to land at the beginning of the experience, as trends showed this deemed the audience more likely to delve deeper into Hibiki’s story for an increased time. Evidently, the partnership had excelled in creating high quality, engaging content to capture the audience’s attention, and spend time exploring the Hibiki brand.

From brand lift research, we uncovered that the partnership had a clear impact on Hibiki brand perceptions, with an increase of 2x for unaided brand recall, and a 2.7x lift for purchase intent. This was a fantastic result in regard to increasing the brand’s awareness and consideration, indicating tangible success against the key objectives of elevating Hibiki’s profile and desirability.

Overwhelmingly, the results demonstrated the campaign had truly achieved the key objectives for Hibiki, by anchoring the brand as the embodiment of Japanese luxury and cultural refinement. The combination of innovative content formats, and a tailored experience of exploration, provoked emotional responses from the audience which in turn produce increased impact for Hibiki as a brand.