OYO Hotels&Homes ropes in Punjab’s Sonu Sood as brand ambassador for its‘Sanitised Before Your Eyes’campaign

October 21, 2020

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OYO Hotels&Homes ropes in Punjab’s Sonu Sood as brand ambassador for its ‘Sanitised Before Your Eyes’ campaign

India is moving again, and travel is opening up but differently. Keeping a close eye on the ever-evolving travel trends and customer sentiments, OYO Hotels & Homes launched Sanitised Stays in partnership with Unilever in May 2020 to enhance its sanitisation and hygiene efforts. Taking it a step further, to showcase the hospitality chain’s sanitisation efforts in real-time and build trust within travellers, today, OYO launches its integrated campaign – SBYE or “Sanitised Before Your Eyes”, with Bollywood actor and OYO asset owner, Sonu Sood as the face of its campaign. This consumer focussed campaign has gone live across TV and digital platforms with its first ad – ‘Pehle Spray, Fir Stay’ today. Sonu Sood hails from the city of Moga in Punjab.

As state borders are opening up to welcome tourists once again, Indians are excited about taking that long due vacation to a nearby hill station, or drive down to the closest beach, or even enjoy a relaxing staycation within city limits. Travel is certainly back, however, consumers are looking for trustworthy accommodation and practices to ease their concerns, and their worries while fulfilling their travel aspirations. Understanding this, OYO’s latest campaign, Sanitised Before Your Eyes aims to give its customers the ease of mind while booking their stays. This is an on-request initiative through which OYO’s guests can request the hotel’s on-ground staff to sanitise high touch spots or frequently touched surfaces right in front of their eyes. Essentially, the sanitisation process will be done using two modes – through an aerosol disinfectant and/or by using a Spray Handy Sanitiser Machine.

The concept of the new TV and social film featuring Sonu Sood revolves around OYO’s asset owners and staff staying a step ahead of the guests’ thought process and sanitising all high touch surfaces right before the guests. The film features Sonu Sood in a red OYO t-shirt, portraying the character of a lively OYO staff. The ad is quirky and filled with humorous moments, and at the same time distinctly communicates the brand’s SBYE experience. For instance, as the guest tries to switch on the room lights, Sonu Sood cuts the guest’s speech midway and swiftly sprays the master switchboard. Similarly, when the guest reaches out to switch on the TV, Sonu once again interjects his speech and sprays the TV remote control and it continues with other objects.

Speaking about the campaign, Mayur Hola, Head of Global Brand, OYO Hotels & Homes said, “Trust and love are like chai and biscuit (biscoot sounds better). The Sanitised Before Your Eyes initiative is a brand trust exercise that walks the talk by disinfecting the room in front of a guest’s eyes. Our consumers asked this of us in the recent Project Hello we conducted, where we all called and spoke 1:1 to folks to understand their needs today. And we’re happy to make it happen. As India hits the road, we’re ensuring Sanitised Stays for our guests, so that they can focus on having a blast, while we focus on taking care of them.”

He adds, “Sonu’s not just a celeb for us, I mean he is. But he is already one of us, an asset owner. His unparalleled contributions towards society are just so amazing. Big respect! The fact that he is one of our partners fills us with so much pride. Now he doesn’t just speak for us, he is OYO.”

Commenting on his association with OYO as the brand ambassador, acclaimed Bollywood actor Sonu Sood said, “As an asset partner with OYO, I have a first-hand experience of the proactive efforts of the OYO team over the last few months, not only to ensure safer experiences but also going above and beyond to become a partner in any given guests’ journey right from the planning process itself. I believe OYO enables people across the board to travel freely, with its affordable and quality stays spread across the farthest corners of India. When approached to be a part of this initiative, I was immediately on board. I believe that today, travellers including myself are constantly worried about hygiene and sanitisation while travelling in a virus-hit world. Witnessing the sanitisation process will reduce guests’ anxiety and worries to a great extent, allowing them to truly enjoy their stay. I am excited to be a part of this journey and hopefully, make a difference to the hundreds of lives of travellers that OYO welcomes everyday by opening its doors to safe and sanitised experiences.”

Both the concept of the campaign and script of the film were written by OYO’s in-house global brand team, with support from UBIK Films on production. The film will go live across offline (print, radio), digital channels (search ads, GDN, social media, YouTube ads, and influencers), partner network, co-OYO app, and CRM via push notifications, WhatsApp, app, website and emailers. OYO will also roll out IPL themed print ads across a leading English and Hindi print and online daily. Some interesting elements of the campaign include a unique conversationalist long copy print ad that will be seeded in leading English, Hindi and digital dailies, whereas the campaign’s social posts will creatively highlight the top 10 objects that will be sanitised through the SBYE SOP through distinct tags on the brand’s Instagram post (yes, this means that every object will have its very own social media handle too).