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After ‘Experience PHL’ fiasco, new unofficial tourism ad goes viral

By MARLLY ROME C. BONDOC, GMA News

A group of advertising creatives created their own version of a Philippine tourism ad amid the fiasco between the Department of Tourism (DOT) and McCann Worldgroup Philippines’ "Experience Philippines" campaign.

 

 

Creatives of Manila shared on its Twitter account an "unofficial, unsanctioned Philippine tourism film created from existing footage." The post has so far garnered over 1,500 retweets as of 4:30 p.m. Friday. It gained support from both netizens and even Senator Sherwin Gatchalian.

The video starts with news sound bites on Philippine current affairs being contrasted with beautiful local sceneries.

It ends with the message: "Sometimes it's hard to fall in love with the Philippines. But most of the time it's harder not to."

In an interview with GMA News Online, Creatives of Manila said that amid the plagiarism issues with DOT's "Sights" campaign, they felt the need to work on a video that would fit with the tagline "It's More Fun in the Philippines."

"When the whole copycat issue surfaced and Asec Alegre talked about 'Experience the Philippines' as being more appropriate in light of the current state of the country, we felt as creatives that there is still a way to work with 'It's more fun in the Philippines' as a tagline even though there are a lot of unpleasant news about the Philippines lately," Creatives of Manila said.

"We know that Filipinos have grown fond of it over the years. Just like many Filipinos, we were looking for an ad that can somehow make the tagline work," it added.

The group said its members "bounced around" some ideas and decided "there's no glossing over the current state of the country."

It said the ad needed to be "heartfelt and sincere" and should "instill pride and love for the country regardless of the situation."

"That's how we thought of contrasting the news clips with beautiful scenes we got online. We found a good soundtrack, put the film together, and wrote copy in the end to get the message across," the group said.

We posted the video to see how people would react to it, whether our hunch was right — that there's something missing about the TVCs the DOT released," it added.

Gatchalian, who found the video "absolutely beautiful," said the DOT should consider using the ad instead.

"It showed everything our beautiful land can offer and more," Gatchalian said on Twitter.

 

 

The DOT drew flak from netizens after its "Sights" ad faced allegations of plagiarism as it had glaring similarities with South Africa's tourism campaign in 2014.

The DOT and McCann have already denied that it was a rip-off, with the latter accepting full responsibility over the matter. However, DOT eventually decided to discontinue its contract with McCann. The department also asked for a public apology from the agency.

McCann, for its part, expressed regret over DOT's decision to cancel its contract.

Missing something

Meanwhile, Creatives of Manila thought that "Sights" itself was "quite good," however it was not "engaging enough."

"But again, it was missing something. It was somehow detached from the current state of the country. We know that it's meant for audiences overseas, but Filipinos by nature are great ambassadors. They are proud of a piece of film, it takes very little effort for Filipinos themselves to promote the film on social media," the group said.

"We really don't have an opinion whether it was a copycat TVC or not because we believe that it was just an unfortunate coincidence. But even if the there is no copycat issue, we had the sense that the film is not connecting somehow to Filipinos," it added.

The group lamented how the DOT scrapped its contract with McCann, saying the situation "could have been handled better."

"We think the relationship should have continued. It's an opportunity to re-calibrate the campaign for both parties. McCann could've even created a campaign out of the issue given that it's already in the public's consciousness," the group said.

"Filipinos are very forgiving people, and if they see that both parties, DOT and McCann, are working together to sort of salvage the campaign in a fun and good-natured way, who knows? Brands have capitalized on mistakes before and succeeded," it added. — MDM/KG, GMA News

Copyright belongs to the following owners of the video clips:

  • Arthur Balaga for the Kalanggaman Island footage
  • Jasper Ivan Iturriaga for the El Nido footage
  • The Philippine Roadtrip team for the Northern Luzon footage
  • NAVA.TV for the Mount Kanlaon footage
  • Max Abaloso for the Batangas footage
  • Beach Weather for the Siargao footage
  • Gabriel Lorenzo for the Caramoan Islands footage
  • Music: 'Everest'  by Lights & Motion
Tags: departmentoftourism, mccannworldgroupphdotcampaignad, experiencephilippines
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