Standard Chartered Bank (SCB): Art Gap

Remie Abdo
Source: WARC Prize for MENA Strategy, Shortlisted, 2020
Downloaded from WARC

Multinational banking company Standard Chartered Bank used a social media approach backed by an
art exhibition to raise awareness of the gender pay gap and the bank's commitment to gender equality
in the United Arab Emirates.

SCB seeks to champion equality but with gender pay disparity becoming the go-to CSR initiative
for almost every brand, and the public unwilling to listen to banks on any subject, SCB had to find
a new way to talk about it.
It found its hook via an Oxford University study that highlighted that works by female artists sold
for 47.6% less than those by men.
For Art Gap, SCB asked 19 female artists to recreate their best paintings leaving 47.6%
incomplete, and exhibited the works during World Art Dubai and publicised it through Facebook,
Instagram and LinkedIn.
The campaign delivered an ROI of 26.45:1 and generated 70% online positive sentiment for SCB.

Campaign details
Brand: Standard Chartered Bank
Brand owner: Standard Chartered
Agency: TBWA\RAAD
Market: United Arab Emirates
Industries: Banks
Media channels: Direct marketing, Events & experiential, Public relations, Social media
Budget: Up to 500k

Executive summary
Standard Chartered Bank, stands for Here For Good, a promise to better the communities it operates in,
including a commitment to promote gender equality.

Lately, Oxford University demonstrated that works by women artists sell for 47.6% less than those by men. SCB
decided to act. But, gender equality has become the go-to CSR initiative topic for almost every brand, in every
industry. Also, all talk about it ended up with just more talk. So how could SCB still open eyes to it and make an
impact?

Armed with the insight 'seeing is believing', SCB decided to show the pay gap and not talk about it.

It created Art Gap, an exhibition that believes 'if women artists are paid 47.6% less, they will paint 47.6% less'. It
brought together 19 women artists and asked them to recreate their best paintings, this time 47.6% incomplete.

The exhibition was held at World Art Dubai, the biggest art fair in the region, where 10,000 people visited Art
Gap. It earned US$1.4m-worth of free media, 7,500 visitors signed the pledge for equal pay, key opinion
leaders, including UN Women, applauded SCB's gender equality efforts, and Google searches about SCB
gender equality grew 20%.

Market background and cultural context

Market background

Standard Chartered Bank (SCB) stands for Here For Good – a promise to improve communities. Lately it
committed itself to promoting gender equality. And it has walked the talk:

In 2016, SCB signed the Fair Pay Charter and pledged to pay men and women equally.
In 2017, it signed the United Nations Women Empowerment Principles in support.
In 2019, it was recognised on the Bloomberg Gender Equality Index for the fourth consecutive year.
Currently, 46% of its global workforce are women, including 13 female CEOs.

In the UAE, SCB has an added incentive to champion equality: a commitment to the nation's vision of being
among the world's top 25 countries for gender equality, by 2021. SCB UAE has four women in senior
management, including its first female CEO, who is Emirati.

Outside the bank, SCB seeks to champion equality, inclusion and female empowerment in the world. Recently, a
study by Oxford University highlighted that works by women artists sold for 47.6% less than those by men.1 A
shocking pay gap that triggered a reaction from SCB.

But, when the topic of gender pay disparity became the go-to CSR initiative for almost every brand in every
industry, how could SCB still captivate audiences and make an impact?

More than 70% of consumers would rather go to the dentist than listen to what a bank has to say.2 And this
statistic presented another challenge to the one mentioned above. In short, SCB had to attract people's attention
on a clichéd subject, when no one was willingly open to hear what a bank had to say. Easy, not.

Objectives
 1. Raise awareness of the gender pay gap
9,000 exhibition visitors – 50% of World Art Dubai attendance.3
Free coverage/advocacy by gender equality organisations and general media.
150K Facebook media impressions – expected return on our US$1,000 investment.4
2. Behavioural change when it comes to gender pay equality
50% of exhibition attendees to sign a pledge to pay both genders equally (i.e. 4,500 pledges).
3. Awareness about SCB's commitment to support gender equality
20% more Google searches about SCB gender parity efforts in the UAE, a month after the exhibition.
4. Share of consumers' hearts
50% positive online sentiment about SCB UAE (from 25%), a week after the exhibition.5
15% engagement with social content – when the industry average is 8%–12%.6
5. Brand lift
Five-point lift in brand awareness
Three-point lift in brand recall
1% lift in brand favourability
3% lift in brand interest

(All the above KPIs are benchmarked against best-in-class Facebook brand lift examples in UAE 2018).7

Insight and strategic thinking

Audience

Cynical consumers

92% of millennials don't trust banks8. 40% of consumers would prefer banking with Google and Amazon.9
Consumers find banks to be dishonest,10 ambiguous,11 and money hungry.12 To fight the scepticism that
surrounds it as a bank, SCB needed to project a selfless image to the general banking consumers.

Hater media

Recently, SCB had suffered a negative media outbreak. Google 'SCB under scrutiny' and discover a myriad of
titles like 'Standard Chartered: The Iranian Connection' or 'Standard Chartered fined $1.1 billion for violating
sanctions'.

This case was one more effort for SCB to overcome negative news with positive news. Media outlets,
influencers, thought leaders and dignitaries were a priority audience.

Broader public

As the focus of this CSR initiative was the gender pay disparity in the art world, art lovers who regularly attend
art fairs and events were a natural choice of audience.

In addition, when it comes to significant social challenges, such as gender inequality, it is highly important to
integrate all layers of society so that everyone can contribute in spreading the word, as well as think of solutions
to create a better society for all.

Insight

Studies declared that institutions that support gender equality are 15% more likely to produce better returns.13
There have been 176K mentions of hashtag #PayGap on Twitter in the past three years.14 Google lists
countless #fempowerment CSR initiatives. Yet, the result has been just more talk.

Astonishingly, gender inequality is still present in the business world. Only snail-paced improvements have been
made, so far. The 47.6% pay gap between male and female artists was just another nail in the coffin.15

Why did all talks not really help? Several facts show that humanity needs visual proof in order to believe:

Aristotle's theory was believed only when the Greek philosopher brought observational evidence of the
rounded shape of Earth's shadow on the Moon during eclipses.16
In Christian tradition, Thomas told the other disciples he needed to see Jesus resurrected to believe in
him.17
And, more recently, what made Einstein's reputation in 20th-century science was a challenging, incredibly
precise observation of a solar eclipse that proved his general theory of relativity for the first time.18

'Seeing is believing' is a powerful and universal insight that has been part of the collective conscious since early
times in human history.

Strategic idea: show the gender pay gap – don't just talk about it.

Creative and/or channel execution

The idea

Art Gap was born. An exhibition that champions the belief: 'if women artists are paid 47.6% less, they should
paint 47.6% less'.

We brought together 19 female artists: Emirati and expat women from 11 nationalities. We asked them to
recreate their best paintings, this time 47.6% incomplete – matching the exact percentage of their pay gap.

The 47.6% blank space on the canvas visualised the pay gap and highlighted what the world would miss if it
didn't start to treat women and men equally.
The event

We partnered with World Art Dubai, the Middle East's largest, and most affordable, art fair, and exhibited Art
Gap as one of its exhibitions. It was held in Dubai World Trade Centre, one of the busiest event venues in the
Middle East, from 3rd until 6th April 2019. The choice to make Art Gap part of an established fair was strategic to
drive footfall and reach the art industry at its core.
We invited the internationally acclaimed artist Batool Jafri, winner of Emirates Woman of the Year 2018 in the
'Art & Culture' category, to curate the exhibition (pictured below).
To make Art Gap more credible and give it more financial importance, we made the paintings available for sale.
The prices were between US$600 and US$1,400. All proceeds were to go towards the artists themselves as this
was a non-profit initiative, and not a charity.

During the exhibition we invited visitors to sign the pledge to pay women and men equally.
The invite

During the week leading up to the exhibition and throughout the fair, we sent people invitations comprising a 28-
second edit shared on social media.

The edit starts by capturing viewers' attention with the statement: 'works by women artists sell for 47.6% less
than those by men'. It then shares the philosophy of the exhibition: 'if women are going to be paid 47.6% less,
they will paint 47.6% less'. Moreover, it intrigues with a showcase of some incomplete paintings and ends with
'Standard Chartered presents Art Gap' accompanied with the date and place of the exhibition.

As our total media budget was only US$1,000, we shared the edit on three specific social channels only:
LinkedIn in order to reach professionals whom we want to foster gender equality at work; Facebook and
Instagram to target art enthusiasts in the UAE.
The art of scale

We kicked off the exhibition with a VVIP event. It was represented by Rola Abu Manneh, CEO of SCB UAE and
attended by influential clients, dignitaries, local and foreign government representatives, influential leaders, key
media representatives and key social influencers. We also invited Hanna Beswick from UN Women and Dr
Maryam Al Suwaidi, Deputy CEO for Financial Markets Operations, Securities & Commodities Authority, to make
keynote speeches.

Throughout the exhibition, we invited other artists to join and make our movement bigger. We gave away 20
blank canvases to young aspiring artists inviting them to join the collective by painting 47.6% less.
Two weeks after the exhibition, we created The Book of Art Gap. A book that is 46.7% cropped, containing
photos of the incomplete paintings and all the pledges signed by the attendees. The book was sent to CEOs
and decision-makers in the UAE, accompanied by a letter from SCB inviting them to join the cause for equal
gender pay.
Performance against objectives
With US$51K total investment (US$1K for media and US$50K for the exhibition and promotional edit), we
successfully:

Opened eyes to the gender pay gap:

Around 10,000 people visited Art Gap (55% of World Art Dubai's attendance), including royalty and
dignitaries such as: His Highness Sheikh Hasher Bin Maktoum Al Maktoum, Director General of the Dubai
Department of Information; Hannah Beswick, UN Women Liaison Representative, and the British Foreign
and Commonwealth Office.19
We earned US$1.4m-worth of free media from outlets such as: Reuters; BBC; The Times; The New York
Times; LadBible; The Art Newspaper; Vice Arabia; Design Taxi and local media.20 This represented an
ROI of 2645%.21
 Social influencers spread the word, reaching 8,918,297 additional audiences for free.20
20m impressions on social media.

Generated promises of equality:

7,500 visitors signed the pledge to pay both genders equally.22

Promoted SCB's commitment to equality:

Key opinion leaders applauded SCB. UN Women: "SC standing up for women"; Dr Al Suwaidi: "SC leading
equality"; Oxford University Professor Renée Adams: "Art Gap, a global innovation".20
A 20% increase in Google searches for SCB gender equality in the UAE.

Won consumers' hearts:

SCB online sentiment: 70% positive (from 25%).23

Facebook content:

20% engagement rate vs. the industry benchmark of 8%–12%.

Shareability: three times the average.
 More than 600 positive comments.
Its performance reduced the cost to US$0.04/10s video-views vs. a benchmark of US$0.08.24

Facebook results:

Reach: 413,479
Impressions: 677,672
10-second video views: 44,987
Video completion at 100%: 7,775
Cost-per-view: $0.04
Post engagements: 143,125
Post comments: 157
Post shares: 185
Post reactions: 2,084
Engagement rate: 21.12%

LinkedIn results:

Impressions: 42,258
Video views: 12,255
View rate: 29.00%
Videos completed at 100%: 2,442
Completion rate: 19.93%
Amount spent: $500.00

Lifted the brand

Best-in-class results in brand awareness, recall, favourability and brand interest:

Won unexpected gains

Although sales weren't an objective, 50% of the artworks were sold.25

Although leads weren't an objective, 200 'Priority Banking' qualified leads were collected during the
exhibition.26
That's not all. Two weeks following the exhibition, we hosted Art Gap in the Dubai International Financial
Centre (DIFC). Next stop: Oxford University.

Lessons learned
All CSR topics have been tackled. Do we stop talking about them?

There are three major problems with CSR initiatives: 1. They are boring. 2. They are often perceived as cause-
washing. 3. Almost all topics have been tackled before.
Yet, the reality is that most of these causes, even though tackled, remain unsolved.

In conclusion… it's not the 'what' in CSR, but the 'how'.

The answer is to keep tackling these issues but innovate efforts. Innovate to open people's eyes again towards
the known and ignored. Innovate to shock with what has become an accepted reality. Innovate so people notice
what's in front of their eyes but can't actually see. Innovate…

Skip the boring reports, 10.5 font-size, explaining the tiny changes the company has made during the
year. Nobody cares about reading this gloomy document. Skip the monotonous conferences. CSR can be fun.
It's time we unbuttoned the CSR suit and skip the BS. It's time we adopted people's language.

That's what Standard Chartered did. It created a beautiful art exhibition to shed light on an ugly reality. It didn't
talk about the cause. It didn't flaunt the efforts it has been doing internally. It simply offered people an exciting
experience that made a point, innovatively.

No matter the topic, if a brand finds an interesting way to talk about it, people will listen and hear.

You've heard about brand purpose. What about banks' brand purpose?

Brand purpose... we've heard many times before and it's probably a lesson on most WARC papers.

While the impact of having a strong brand purpose is undeniable, for banks it's a 'have a purpose or die'
situation.

Most banks promise caring for consumers with taglines like: 'Always where you are', 'Together, we thrive',
'Together, we'll go far', 'It's all about you', 'Banking focused on you', 'By your side', etc. However, people's trust in
banks has never been as brittle: 92% of people don't trust banks; 71% of consumers would rather go to the
dentist than listen to a bank; 68% of millennials feel their banks fail to acknowledge their needs.

This situation compels banks to realign their relationship with the societies in which they operate. And to
redefine the role they want to play, beyond the guardians of people's money and being a 'great' partner to their
consumers (as suggested by their taglines).

Having a strong brand purpose that benefits communities, societies, and even humanity, is far more important
for banks than any other industry.

No wonder Binet and Field's recommendation for the optimum balance of spend between 'brand building' and
'sales activation' for financial services is 77:23, the highest among all other industries.

Media is a crowded place. Avoid it.

People are exposed to around 4,000 to 10,000 advertising messages a day. How many of them will be
remembered? This information overload is the number-one challenge for today's marketers. Consumers today
not only ignore advertising messages, but also find ways to block them.

Financial services are suffering even more from this disinterest because no one seems to care about banks.

In order to stand out from the crowd, perhaps our best choice is to skip the crowd.

Create a new media. It doesn't have to be anything like media. Why limit ourselves to the usual suspects? It
could be interesting. Anything, and anyone, can be media today. The gym is media, the coach is media, the
teacher is media, the restaurant menu is media, every celebrity is media, phone covers are media, concerts are
media, exhibitions are media… there are no limits to what can be considered media, and there are no limits to
creating new ones.

ROI
The campaign delivered an ROI figure of 26.45:1 based on the value of exposure and coverage.

Client’s view
“At Standard Chartered we are passionate about promoting equality and committed to driving an inclusive and
diverse culture at work. The Art Gap exhibition is a great initiative to highlight such an important topic; gender
pay inequality. We want others to get inspired by this event and to support the drive for change, not only in the
world of art or banking, but in all industries. I encourage you all to join us and support the cause. Organising
this event reaffirms the Bank’s commitment to the national agenda, which aims to make the UAE one of the
world’s top 25 countries for gender equality by 2021.”

– Rola Abu Manneh, CEO Standard Chartered UAE

Sources
1. 'Is gender in the eye of the beholder?' Gender Bias in Art Study, University of Oxford – Saïd Business
School, December 2017 (Concerted experiments by researchers found that respondents ranked works they
believed to be by male artists higher than those believed to be by female artists, even when they were
generated by artificial intelligence. Analysis of some 1.5m auction sales records also confirmed that
attitudes towards women are a leading explanation for the gender gap in prices)
2. Javelin Research & Strategy, 2018
3. World Art Dubai, 2019 – benchmark based on 2018 numbers, where 18,000 visitors attended the exhibition
4. Facebook Advertising Benchmarks, wordstream, 2017 (Rachelbeaney.com/adcostsinfographic)
5. Crimson Hexagon
6. Media Agency
7. Communicate, 'Advertising on Facebook in Ramadan? Learn from these three case studies.' May, 2018
8. 'Millennials + money: The unfiltered journey' Facebook Inc., 2016
9. Accenture Financial Services – Marketing Consumer Study, 2017
10. 'The culture of banking is skewed to be dishonest' Fintech Insider
11. 'High street banks making millions by confusing consumers' The Independent
12. 'Free accounts that aren't actually Free' HuffPost
13. 'Why Diversity Matters', McKinsey, 2015.
14. Crimson Hexagon
15. 'Is gender in the eye of the beholder?' Gender Bias in Art Study, University of Oxford - Saïd Business
School, Dec 2017
16. 'Who did discover that the Earth was round?' Futura Planet
17. Thomas the Apostle, according to the Bible
18. The Experiment That Made Einstein Famous. Essay by Andrew Robinson, February 14 2019
19. World Art Dubai, 2019
20. Media Agency
21. ROI = [(return – investment)/investment] x 100. ROI = [(US$1.4m – US$51,000/US$51,000] x 100 = 2645%
22. Agency count of sales, and signatures on the Art Gap Book
23. Crimson Hexagon, one week following the exhibition
24. Facebook
25. Agency count of sales, and signatures on the Art Gap Book
26. Standard Chartered UAE

© Copyright Ascential Events (Europe) Limited 2020

Ascential Events (Europe) Limited
Americas: 229 West 43rd Street, 7th Floor, New York, NY 10036, United States - Tel: +1 212 201 2800
APAC: OUE Downtown 1, #44-03, 6 Shenton Way, 068809, Singapore - Tel: +65 3157 6200
EMEA: 33 Kingsway, London, WC2B 6UF, United Kingdom - Tel: +44 (0)20 7467 8100

www.warc.com

All rights reserved including database rights. This electronic file is for the personal use of authorised users based at the subscribing
company's office location. It may not be reproduced, posted on intranets, extranets or the internet, e-mailed, archived or shared electronically
either within the purchaser's organisation or externally without express written permission from Warc.