Matt Bain: Spark marketing and data director on the popularity of the AI-generated Skinny ad

TRA’s latest New Zealand’s Favourite Ads survey for June 2025 has revealed what ads Kiwis are loving the most - and one of the top contenders is powered by AI.

Skinny's new ad campaign starring a digitally cloned 64-year-old Liz Wright - chosen from hundreds of entries in a nationwide search - rounded out the top 10 in a list including Tux, One NZ, KFC and Turners. 

Spark's marketing and data director, Matt Bain, says AI has allowed digital effects in advertising to become more 'democratised'.

"Brands like Skinny can actually do things like clone a customer and then create scenes that wouldn't have been possible on Skinny's budgets."

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Turns out one of our favorite ads at the moment
is an ad that's been made by AI.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
I'm a real Skinny mobile customer who loves them so
much that I let them digitally clone me using AI.

Speaker 1 (00:12):
The AI generated Skinny ad came in fresh at number
ten of our favorite ads in the country. Tina from
Turner's takes out the number one spot. Matt Bain is
marketing and data director. It's Spark which owns Skinny, and
he's with been our Hey Matt.

Speaker 2 (00:26):
Hey, how are you going?

Speaker 1 (00:27):
So? How does can you just explain how this ad
was generated?

Speaker 2 (00:32):
Yes? So, in the past, like low cost brands like
skin he wouldn't be able to use CGIO computer generated
imagery to create scenes. New AI capabilities means that that's
now been democratized, so so brands like Skinny can actually
do things like, you know, clone a customer and then
create scenes that wouldn't have been possible on Skinny's budgets.

Speaker 1 (00:54):
This is her name's Liz, isn't it Liz from Carried.

Speaker 2 (00:56):
Her name is Liz yep from from the North Islands. Yep.

Speaker 1 (00:59):
So she's all because people will know this ad. I
mean I don't know why, but It sticks in your mind,
doesn't it.

Speaker 2 (01:05):
Yeah, Liz is great. She actually used to work for
Spark many years ago as a technician. She's a loyal
Skinny customer. And Skinny's got this great tradition of like
using its customers and it's advertising. So this is kind
of an evolution of what skin he has always done.

Speaker 1 (01:18):
Right, and so she's real and then she's sort of
been cloned and that part of it is cgi'ed and
does that make is it cheap to do?

Speaker 2 (01:28):
Yeah, because it used to be that, you know, it's
Lord of the Ring style. CGI is what you used
to have to do, which is a massive production, and
now AI makes it possible to do it, you know,
at a fraction of that cost. And so for us,
you know, it's a really novel way to present our
new spokesperson. And so Skinny is all about finding new ways,
you know, hacking systems, finding new ways to give customers

(01:49):
deals and new ways to advertise itself. And so we
felt that this technology, particularly when it's new and novel,
was an awesome opportunity to kind of do that.

Speaker 1 (01:57):
Do you think that's why people like it because it's
new and or is this just a sign that actually
people don't mind AI generation content.

Speaker 2 (02:06):
I think that part of our objective was to educate
people about the fact that this content could be generated
by AI, because there's a lot of fear at the
moment around it, and so we wanted to a use
the novelty. I think over time it will become more
common to be less novel and then you know, it's
hard to cut through advertising, so you're always looking for
something novel to do. So my expectation is as it
becomes more widespread, it will become less powerful as a novelty.

(02:29):
But that's why we've moved fast on it to try
and make the most of that kind of novelty.

Speaker 1 (02:34):
And what sort of deal did Liz get? I mean,
if you keep recreating her and she's not needed anymore,
does she still get paid?

Speaker 2 (02:41):
Well, we still, yeah, we're still using her as well,
so it's not like goodbye Liz. But so she got
she got a talent fee, so we worked we had
to work around what does a talent fee look like
when you're using AI as opposed to just recording a
one off video. And of course and of course she
got free Skinny Mobile for life as well, so added perk.
On top of the bonus, it's talent.

Speaker 1 (03:01):
Liz is a happy customer, Matt, Thank you, Matt. Brain
marketing and data director sparking Z also on Skinny For
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