Senoko Energy is one of Singapore's largest electricity retailers, serving both residential and commercial customers across the country. With a competitive open electricity market and strong default-provider inertia, acquiring new homeowners at the moment they are most receptive is both the biggest opportunity and the biggest challenge in the category.

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Challenge

Moving into a new home is a high-intent but high-friction life stage. Homeowners juggle renovations, logistics, and dozens of pending decisions simultaneously, leaving little attention or patience for complex processes. In Singapore's open electricity market, new homeowners need to open an SP account first before they can switch to a retail electricity provider, making the switch feel like an additional step on top of an already overwhelming list. Even when better plans and rates are available, that extra friction is often enough for homeowners to defer the decision entirely.

Traditional acquisition channels, digital ads, lead forms, and roadshows struggled to overcome this inertia. Senoko Energy needed to intercept homeowners at exactly the right moment, reduce decision friction, and do so at scale without adding operational headcount.

A behavioural insight shaped the campaign's approach: homeowners are most receptive to making decisions outside office hours, during late evenings and weekends, when they are settled at home and mentally ready to resolve outstanding tasks. The solution needed to be accessible and responsive at any hour, not just during business hours.

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Solution

Senoko Energy partnered with ABrandADay and AiChat to evolve its proven New Home, New Vibes 3.0 campaign into a fully AI-powered WhatsApp marketing automation engine for its third consecutive year. In 2025, New Home, New Vibes 3.0 shifted the entire acquisition journey from web forms into conversational messaging — meeting homeowners where they already were.

A culturally grounded campaign hook

The campaign was anchored in a local tradition Singaporean homeowners immediately recognised: rolling a pineapple into a new home upon key collection, symbolising good fortune and fresh beginnings. This gave rise to “BB Ong Lai”, a pineapple plushie mascot whose name references the Hokkien phrase for prosperity. For New Home, New Vibes 3.0, the mechanic offered up to $18,000 in COURTS vouchers prize. Rather than a generic giveaway, the prize was designed specifically for new homeowners actively furnishing their homes, ensuring the right audience entered the funnel with high intent.

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Ads that open a conversation, not a landing page

The campaign ran on Meta click-to-message ads across Facebook Reels, Facebook Feeds, Instagram Stories, and Instagram Reels. Instead of directing users to a website, every ad click opened a WhatsApp conversation instantly, eliminating the drop-off that landing pages typically cause and reducing the distance between interest and action to a single tap.

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An AI chatbot that works around the clock

Once inside WhatsApp, users were greeted by Selena, AiChat's AI-powered chatbot, who guided them through contest sign-up, captured lead details and marketing consent, and answered pre-sales questions about electricity plans in real time. Complex queries were escalated to Senoko Energy's live agents only when necessary. Crucially, the chatbot operated 24/7, ensuring homeowners received immediate responses at any hour, with no increase in staffing cost.

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Personalised follow-ups triggered by user data

Lead details, including customer status, homeowner status, current electricity provider, and key collection date were captured before contest participation. AiChat's marketing automation then used this data to trigger personalised follow-ups at key moments throughout each user's journey.

Non-customers received electricity plan sign-up prompts with gift and rebate options. Existing customers were guided towards renewal and Smart Rewards journeys. When homeowners mentioned a key collection date, they received a congratulatory message at that milestone along with a timely prompt to make the switch. Winner announcements and draw reminders were fully automated via broadcast, consistently achieving strong open rates throughout the campaign.

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Results

In the New Home, New Vibes 3.0 campaign (2025), Senoko Energy achieved its highest conversion rate across three years of the campaign by shifting from web-based acquisition to AI-powered WhatsApp conversations built by AiChat.

Improved customer experience at scale

By replacing static landing pages and lead forms with a guided WhatsApp conversation, homeowners received immediate, personalised responses at every stage of their journey, from initial enquiry through to plan sign-up. The experience felt human at scale, with AiChat's chatbot adapting responses based on each user's inputs rather than following a fixed script.

Faster access to information

Homeowners could get instant answers to plan queries, pricing comparisons, and eligibility questions at any time of day. This removed a key friction point in the switching decision and allowed Senoko Energy to remain present during the moments homeowners were most ready to act, evenings and weekends included.

Significantly higher conversion versus traditional channels

The WhatsApp channel delivered markedly higher conversion efficiency compared to the campaign website, demonstrating that meeting homeowners on a familiar, trusted platform with real-time AI support meaningfully outperforms directing them to a form.

Reduced manual workload for the Senoko Energy team

AiChat's always-on automation handled the majority of enquiries, follow-ups, and lead nurturing without manual intervention. Complex cases were escalated to live agents only when genuinely necessary, freeing the team to focus on higher-value interactions.

Meaningful drop-off recovery

Automated follow-up messages re-engaged users who had dropped off mid-journey, recovering a noticeable share of leads that would otherwise have been lost and sustaining conversion momentum well beyond the initial campaign interaction.

More plan sign-ups than contest completions

Even users who did not complete the contest registration remained reachable through automated follow-ups, and a meaningful proportion went on to sign up for or renew an electricity plan — demonstrating that the WhatsApp automation drove real commercial outcomes well beyond the campaign mechanic itself.

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Industry Recognition for AI & Marketing Innovation

The New Home, New Vibes 3.0 campaign was recognised at the MARKies Awards Singapore 2026 in two categories: Most Effective Use of Marketing Automation and Most Effective Use of Artificial Intelligence, awarded jointly to Senoko Energy, ABrandADay, and AiChat Pte Ltd.

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