Ace2Three builds greater brand awareness through sharp targeting

As a recreational activity, gaming has mass appeal regardless of age, gender and demographic. With better connectivity and a rising youth population, it was natural for online gaming in India to step up over the past few years.

Skill-based game rummy, alone, is growing at a CAGR of 34% with 2019 seeing investments to the tune of INR 700 crore in digital advertising spends. These investments are only expected to rise in 2020.[1]

Online rummy portal Ace2Three has a clear distinction: it was the first-ever website to introduce Indians to online rummy. However, with more portals coming up over the years, Ace2Three wanted to establish itself as a leader in the category by building brand awareness and acquiring new users. It partnered with Disney+ Hotstar to leverage the latter’s sharp geo-targeting to specific cohorts.

Ace2Three aimed for maximum reach with messaging featuring winners, to help drive installations. For awareness, the brand decided to leverage the ‘nostalgia’ associated with rummy-playing. 

1. Sharply targeting ads across high impact assets
2. Associating with Disney+ Hotstar’s marquee regional properties
3. Building message associations with longer edits of video ads

The winning hand 

This strategy worked effectively for Ace2Three. At 95% confidence intervals, the campaign led to significant uplifts in brand messaging and awareness. The numbers show an 8% uplift in aided awareness, with 14% and 6% uplift in message association and usage, respectively.

Disney+ Hotstar’s geo-targeting helped get the message across to male and female cohorts as well. Men recorded a higher aided awareness at 11% with a 20% uplift in message association, as compared to women. The numbers for female cohorts show a 6% and 8% uplift for aided awareness and message association, respectively.

With the application of the right efficient strategy, Ace2Three was able to taste success and achieve all its objectives with Disney+ Hotstar.

When it comes to the online rummy category, the combination of targeted ads and high impact assets help solve for user acquisition, as is also the case with Ace2Three. Some other best practices for the category include:

Geographically tailored creatives appeal to the regional audience’s sentimentality, driving high VTRs.

Associations with high impact properties can help maximise reach in core markets

Video midroll takeovers can aggregate a high percentage of the cumulative reach in the most cost-efficient manner

When it comes to reinforcing brand messages, multiple creatives paired with advertising assets work very well.