ABC ‘House of Gods’ CALD Communications Campaign

ABC’s Australian drama series centres around an ambitious Iraqi Australian family navigating newfound power and privilege within their local mosque. With an entirely Arab Australian cast, the potential to connect and engage culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) communities such as Iraqi, Arabic-speaking, and Muslim Australians was identified early by the ABC.

This project marked a significant milestone as the first in-language campaign to drive awareness and viewership of the ‘House of Gods’ TV series among these communities whilst activating cultural pride and engagement.

CulturalPulse aimed to create a campaign that not only raised awareness but also fostered a sense of cultural connection and relevance. The campaign needed to go beyond traditional marketing and embrace an audience-led cultural approach. This meant understanding the unique values, beliefs, and cultural nuances of the target audience and incorporating these insights into the campaign strategy. The goal was to create a campaign that felt authentic and relatable to Iraqi, Arabic-speaking, and Muslim Australians, ultimately driving them to watch the series.

By working with the ABC and leveraging our deep understanding of CALD audiences, CulturalPulse not only met the media objectives for ‘House of Gods’ but also contributed to a deeper cultural conversation within the community.

The Approach

To drive engagement for ‘House of Gods’, and reach new audiences for ABC TV and ABC iview, CulturalPulse activated media amplification, creative adaptation and community outreach to supplement ABC’s mainstream promotion and publicity.

Insights and Strategy:

Our research revealed there are approximately 367,000 Arabic-speaking Australians, constituting 3.2% of the Australian population. Our strategy focused on utilising culturally relevant content that resonated with these communities, aiming to deepen awareness of ABC as a trusted and relatable media channel. The goal was not only to increase viewership of ‘House of Gods’ but also to drive downloads of the ABC iview platform.

Arabic Content and Creative:

• CulturalPulse conducted a thorough cultural review and Arabic translations of the content to ensure its relevance and resonance with target audiences.
• Leveraging the diverse backgrounds of the cast and crew, we promoted story-led Arabic video to drive awareness and anticipation for the upcoming program.
• Mainstream campaign creative was translated and tailored to resonate with cultural audiences, highlighting themes and narratives that would be engaging and meaningful.

Cultural Targeted Media and Community:

• We utilised CulturalPulse’s owned digital and social platform to target specific cultural segments such as Arab Australians, Muslim Australians, Lebanese, and Iraqi, ensuring that our messaging reached the right audience.
• We engaged with community groups and organisations such as Anoujoum Magazine, Lebanese Australian Facebook, and Iraquis in Australia Facebook through targeted cultural publications.
• Trusted community partners were useful to ensure reach and enable the key messages to be effectively communicated within the target communities. This approach helped us connect with the community on a more personal and culturally relevant level.
• We engaged with selected community media outlets to reach a broader audience.
• Our Cultural Ambassador Network was integrated into the campaign outreach and attended event screenings for cultural representation and promotion.

The Outcome

The campaign was in-market for 4 weeks reaching over half of the Arabic and Muslim population (1.3m) in Australia including Iraqi, Arabic-speaking and Muslim Australians.

• Over 2.2 million impressions with high awareness in target communities.
• Over 675,000 reach (minimum unique) in community segments through CulturalPulse network distribution.
• Over 25,000 clicks to dedicated ABC iview landing pages.
• Mix of media channels including digital, radio, print and social media.

In addition we delivered:

• The campaign achieved a high impact including more than 120 community members who attended premiere screenings in Sydney, Parramatta, and Melbourne – facilitated by the Production Team.
• Interviews with 12 community media outlets, coordinating more than 10 interviews with the cast.
• Broad distribution of the Q&A session between Majid Shokor and Kamel El Basha with over 4 different outlets publishing the interview.

Some key themes used throughout the campaign to connect with Arabic and Muslim communities included:

• ‘Our stories, our way’ – House of Gods was written and directed by Arab Australians ensuring that stories unfolded from within and authentically represented the food, music and traditional cultural traditions.
• ‘Strong female characters’ – House of Gods has strong female representation who brilliantly portrayed the complexities of life as a modern Muslim woman.
• ‘Truth telling’ – this was a rare but beautiful opportunity for Arab-Australian and Muslim life to be documented on their terms on a national platform.

“A very relatable drama series that portrays the challenges of being a Muslim in general, and in the Australian community in particular.” – Muslim Community Representative