Australia Post pens open letter to the country in ‘Dear Australia’ campaign
Australia Post has opened a national letterbox, inviting Australians to post letters documenting their experience of lockdown, with the intention of creating an historical archive from this period.
The campaign, created by The Monkeys, has launched with a film showing Australians how isolation has brought them together through the eyes of a postman.
Wouldn’t it be easier if people could send an email instead
So many things wrong with this.
1) The address isn’t postage paid so you’re asking customers to pay their own way
2) Australia Post is pretty vocal about their statistics saying letters are in decline because of consumer’s behaviour to adopt digital channels. So you’re asking them to write a letter?
3) There’s zero return for customers. They get nothing out of it other than the, hopefully, intrinsic feel good factor for doing it.
4) I can say without a shadow of a doubt they’ll get inundated with complaints about Australia Post’s service rather than stories of COVID.
I think it’s a great initiative. I’m sure there will be lots of Australians wanting to share their Coronavirus social distancing stories. I will be one of them.
Take care Karen Coulson
Hhmmm,
What a miss-read of the current situation many Australians are feeling and experiencing right now. I know there may be some virtue in “reflection”. However for the CMO to state program is, “an opportunity to commemorate and reflect on their journey”, when that reflection may very well be; 1) Loss of job, 2) Stood down, 3) No income for 8 weeks, 4) Frozen mortgage payments 5) many more….. That CMO and The Monkey’s have totally miss-read the current sentiment of the community – eight weeks into the shut down.
All it shows is a wealthy business, paying Ray Martin a fortune to voice the ad, and a total disconnect with the audience. There will be much back slapping – with the Agency and the Client – but get real people.
Poor work and poor form.
As a TV watcher, when I saw this ad on Wednesday night, I actually thought, ‘aw, that’s cute; good fit for Aus Post’. It’s not going to move me to any action, but I didn’t feel any of the negative angles being commented above.
Hhmmm,
“As a TV watcher…..and a close associate of The Monkey’s or Australia Post” – very transparent commentary in an attempt to balance the ledger. Enjoy the conversation.
Perhaps Australia Post might like to comment on how bulk mail lodged with Aussie Post is taking five weeks to travel from Sydney to West Australia? It usually takes them two weeks, while private trucking companies distribute magazines to WA from NSW within the week.
The lowest cost price to send a magazine by post from Australia to the Uk is $20 and the timeframe is three months.
Dear Australia- not only freaky, also obsequius. It’s paradoxical that you can buy everything at A. Post except a letter writing pad! A. Post needs to get its strategy and its s.h.i.t together. You can’t write good ads before you write good strategy. The creative is not relevant before the strategy is. Most agencies are not very good at strategy and rely creatives to make up short falls in thinking they’re not equipped to.
What a fantastic idea, the pleasure of letter writing has been lots in today’s world. The pandemic has grounded all of us and for once we have been silenced. In this moment we have all experience a range of emotions and perhaps reflection on what is important to us. Recording this moment in time is absolutely marvelous. I would love to be part of it. Thank you
What a great idea! Everyone’s experience of isolation is so different it will be amazing for the children that are babies now or haven’t been born yet to be able to learn about how it was for us. For me, mostly positive actually! But I’ll pop it in the letter for you to read later 🙂 and, I don’t mind buying a stamp to contribute to a bit of history 🙂