However, the abstract nature of 5G makes it challenging to grasp 5G’s value for the average person. No one, no competitor or even Telia, has been able to explain the endless possibilities of 5G to consumers.

The brief was to come up with a 360 campaign with earned potential across media, digital and physical channels that showed how 5G is relevant for everyone, not only business and industries, in a way that was interesting for the general public.

The overall objectives were to position Telia as the leader within Swedish 5G. More specific goals involved high campaign engagement, visits to campaign site, high brand visibility, national, local and industry PR, and positive sentiment around the campaign both internally and externally.

5G has the power to solve humanities biggest challenges, like the future of sustainable food supply. To make it understandable and interesting we used the most common item of the Swedish kitchen and made a regular onion into an engine for communicating change.

Telia teamed up with agricultural robotics company Ekobot, and used 5G-powered autonomous field robots for precision farming to take care of weed control and farming of onions. A method that means less pesticides, better taste, longer shelf life, and a larger harvest.

The 5G-onion was born, and we launched it as the tech innovation it truly is, using the same visual expression and tonality as other tech products. We took an incomprehensible topic that can change the world and turned it into a small subject that could be placed on dinner plates, making people interested in 5G, a product they normally can’t see, feel, or eat.

By using all the layers in the idea, we could use it as a limited-edition give-away in Telia’s stores, as delicious meals for influencers, a symbol for sustainable farming, a product at the super- and farmers market, content for recipes in food blogs, and even as a concrete symbol of internal pride for the Telia employees.

First, we launched a teaser on social media hinting Telia’s next big and latest innovation which triggered speculation. On the day of the launch, a bombastic 5G onion launch movie was shared in all digital channels accompanied by both paid and earned coverage in tier 1 Swedish media, and across media segments where 5G is never a part of the conversation.

We also launched the onion as a limited edition drop in Telia’s stores, supermarkets, and farmer’s markets to bridge the campaign to the physical world.

To keep the story going we engaged different target groups by translating the onion into relevant formats for discussion. Depending on the channels and audiences reached, different parts of the story were focused on (sustainability, technology, and taste) and we used different spokespersons: Telia’s R&D, stores, and Sweden’s most renowned chef. - Total reach: 81?424?993 - Coverage: 172% above target - Visitors campaign site: 236,020 (23500% above target) - Onions picked up in store: 12?600 (260% above target) - Sales of onions increased by 300% in local supermarket - Internally, 79,7% thought it was better or much better in comparison to previous campaigns by Telia. - And 68,8% felt proud about working at Telia thanks to the 5G onion. - Brand tracker: 5G development leader, all time high

But most importantly, we made a complicated subject like 5G easy to digest.

Or as a leading Swedish newspaper put it: “You know the world’s gone crazy when a telecom brand like Telia is selling vegetables”.