• by Aaron Baar , November 1, 2011

Fresh off expanding into a national footprint with availability at Best Buy and Best Buy Mobile stores, Leap Wireless’ Cricket brand is looking to expand its customer base with a new marketing campaign that asks consumers which they would rather choose: paying more or getting more. (The question is rhetorical.)

“Historically, our DNA has been about value and innovation,” Jaime Vasquez, the company’s vice president of consumer marketing, tells Marketing Daily. “Now that we’ve elevated the brand to a national level and [increased] consideration, we felt we could take that message to the national level.”

The new campaign, from agency TPN, aims to put consumers in the driver’s seat by juxtaposing two choices (such as $110/month vs. $55 for unlimited talk, text and data) and then telling them it’s “Your Call.” A television commercial that will begin appearing in prime-time programming shows a windup monkey crashing cymbals together as a woman mocks it.

“Monkeying around?” says a voiceover before the picture switches to a group of chimpanzees playing rock music while a man listens through his phone. “Or play all day,” concludes the voiceover. The commercial also showcases the difference in price points of other plans, telling customers they can choose to either “line [the] pockets” of other wireless companies or “load your [music] library.”

The new campaign, which will include radio, out-of-home, digital and retail elements, is a shift away from the company’s previous campaign, which focused heavily on price and employed the tagline, “respect for your wallet.” As the company looked to evolve its strategy from focusing on price to consumers seeking “real-life value,” the previous tag may have been perceived as patronizing, Vasquez says.

The emphasis on music in the television commercial is also a direct nod to the company’s Muve Music offering that offers unlimited music downloads, in addition to calling and texting features. “What we’ve been leveraging Muve for is a key differentiator,” Vasquez says. “You grow a business on the back of innovation.”

As the company expands its target, it is also broadening its media reach, using out-of-home in more suburban locations and expanding its radio beyond urban and hip-hop stations. The retail elements will be employed not only in the Cricket stores, but also in Best Buy locations around the country.

All of the elements will be tied together through the “Your Call” tagline and a green color scheme to tie the elements together. That color scheme, which includes gradations of green and subtle movements in television commercials, will also be employed in a series of YouTube videos created by New York University graduate students, which the company hopes will turn into viral hits.