Case study: what can we learn from the campaigns of Gojek, BAEMIN and GrabFood?

Updated on October 18, 2026: figures reviewed and updated.

Case study: what can we learn from the campaigns of Gojek, BAEMIN and GrabFood?

Food delivery is a promising business in Vietnam as Vietnamese eating habits change, but competition is fierce: BAEMIN left Vietnam on December 8, 2023, and Gojek followed on September 16, 2024. This article looks back at the standout food delivery marketing campaigns that Gojek, BAEMIN and GrabFood ran between 2018 and 2022, and at the lessons they leave behind.

Inside Gojek’s marketing campaigns

“The most important thing about creativity is that you always have to be making something. ‘Creative’ means ‘to create’, so never stop creating new things and learning from the whole process. The more you practice making things, the easier it becomes to come up with more and more ideas.” That is how Bahari Chandra, Creative Director of GO-JEK, puts it.

Did you see Gojek’s ads when you drove past the Senayan roundabout a few months ago? Or did you read the whole ad copy while you were stuck in traffic in Kuningan?

Few people know the story behind how Gojek’s ad campaigns are made. Each campaign starts from a specific goal, and the Creative Labs team turns ideas that seem impossible into successful campaigns. Here are 5 examples of GO-JEK’s most viral ad campaigns.

The #LifeWithoutLimits campaign

The #HidupTanpaBatas, or #LifeWithoutLimits, copy was written to let people know that Gojek is more than a ride-hailing app: it also offers 18 other services that make people’s lives easier. The big challenge in creating this campaign was turning that objective into a key message that people would understand, so they would get what Gojek was trying to say.

Because the purpose of the campaign was to announce Gojek as a brand, Bahari and his team created a dynamic tagline that was clear and playful. They came up with copy built on the phrase “…without…”, such as “Attend the meeting without being late”, “Buy martabak without queuing” and “Bring surprises without waiting”.

Alongside the ad copy, the #LifeWithoutLimits video series featured Dian Sastro, Rio Dewanto, Irfan Bachdim and other celebrities, each telling stories about how GO-JEK meets their daily needs through the full range of GO-JEK products. Which raises a question: have you written your own line describing #LifeWithoutLimits yet?

The GO-FOOD: Menu Terserah campaign

The idea for the GO-FOOD: Menu Terserah (“Whatever Menu”) campaign came from one of the Performance Marketing teams. It was based on data showing that many consumers got stuck deciding what to order on GO-FOOD, and in the end either ordered nothing at all or ordered the dish they usually ordered.

So Gojek ran a campaign around a “whatever” feature that let people order any dish on GO-FOOD at random. As a result, sales from GO-FOOD orders went up.

The GO-JEK Versi Kamu or #YourGOJEK campaign

Which character in “GO-JEK Versi Kamu” did you like best? Before the campaign launched, Bahari and the team had to draw up a list of well-known characters first.

The goal of this campaign was to announce the changes to the GO-JEK home screen and show how users could personalize it. So the key word in the brief was “personal”, because users could choose which GO-JEK products they use most to appear on the app’s home screen.

One surprise came when the team looked at the data: before GoJek published the campaign, users had already discovered the new interface and were trying to personalize it. Bahari and his team therefore felt they did not need to publish content packed with information. Instead, they made the home screen fun and picked 3 characters to appear in the campaign: Gozali, Kunti and the Cinema Announcer.

The #CariPahala campaign

Thinking differently is a must if you work in GO-JEK’s Creative Lab team, because you need to come up with ideas nobody else has done before. When Ramadhan came around, Bahari noticed that brands usually make campaigns built on emotional content. So he challenged that habit with the #CariPahala trend, a Ramadhan campaign whose goal was to carry GO-JEK’s brand message.

#CariPahala, which means “seeking rewards”, is a local insight that describes how Indonesian Muslims behave during Ramadhan. They are very likely to be doing good deeds every day because it is a holy month. Before publishing the campaign, the team surveyed people about the ad copy to make sure it would not trigger any negative reaction from Muslims. The result: people really liked the copy.

The #AnakBangsaBisa campaign

Can you name the things that make Indonesians proud to be Indonesian? That question kept Bahari thinking when he and the team had to come up with a campaign to celebrate Indonesia’s Independence Day.

Bahari said: “We didn’t want to just make an anniversary ad. We wanted to do something truly different and meaningful. I think what brings us together is when our products are recognized by other countries, or when someone achieves great success abroad, like the pianist Joey Alexander.”

That was when his team came up with #AnakBangsaBisa, a campaign that honors people and brands that have achieved something abroad. The key word for this campaign was Indonesian pride, in line with the goal of stirring national spirit in Indonesia.

As with #CariPahala, the team ran a small survey before announcing the campaign. In it, they asked people whether they knew the list of people and brands that had achieved something abroad. The campaign used flower arrangements as its theme, with a signature for authenticity, since that is how Indonesians show appreciation for others.

The campaign did not run only on billboards and social media. GO-JEK also sent flower arrangements directly to offices, athletes and public figures.

The Creative Labs team showed that creativity needs to be backed by data, and that advertising is about more than making the most original campaigns. It is also about carrying out ideas that can have a positive effect on people’s lives.

The GoCar Protect campaign in Vietnam

Why the campaign was created

“Safety and health” had arguably never been a higher priority than during the Covid-19 period. Users’ habits and behavior changed completely during the pandemic, especially when it came to getting around. A survey by Gojek Vietnam in October 2021 found that “safety and health” was one of the top 3 factors people considered when traveling.

Against that backdrop, Gojek launched its GoCar Protect ride-hailing service on November 18, 2021, after a long period of social distancing. The move gave drivers and customers hope for an integrated service with strong features that kept rides safe and protected passengers’ health. The service had actually launched in August 2021, but until then GoCar Protect was used only to carry frontline medical staff fighting the pandemic. On January 4, 2022, GoCar Protect officially arrived in Hanoi.

What was the campaign trying to achieve?

Gojek’s campaign had 2 main goals:

• Launch the GoCar Protect service in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi
• Highlight GoCar Protect’s “Antibacterial X3” strength to keep users safe while traveling.

GoCar Protect was the first brand to set an “Antibacterial X3” standard, made up of: a protection protocol (Gojek-standard hand sanitizer, face masks, wet wipes and so on), Gojek drivers who had all received 2 vaccine doses, and GoCar vehicles fitted with air purifiers that neutralize 99.4% of viruses. The whole standard was wrapped up in the message “Chống khuẩn X3: An toàn có GoCar” (“Antibacterial X3: you’re safe with GoCar”).

Launching the campaign

Launching a campaign during a sensitive period is a challenge for any brand. To make sure the campaign succeeded, the Gojek team split it into 2 phases:

Pilot phase (October 2021)

Before rolling the campaign out widely, Gojek launched the service for medical staff, Gojek employees and a group of existing users to build buzz and share of voice. This “create a positive impact” approach is what made Gojek’s campaign work.

Official launch phase (November 18 to December 20, 2021)

• Held a press conference in Ho Chi Minh City to officially launch the GoCar Protect service
• Released a TVC and promoted it across digital, social media and OOH channels
• Added tactics to boost engagement between the brand and users, such as minigames and a dance challenge.

Much of GoCar Protect’s success came from working with ambassador Sơn Tùng M-TP, a singer known for inspiring young Vietnamese. Sơn Tùng M-TP said that before agreeing to become an ambassador, he weighed 3 main factors: the brand’s credibility, the quality of the service and the long-term strategy. The partnership gave Gojek a young, credible and professional brand image in the eyes of Vietnamese users.

Using a wide mix of marketing channels to spread the campaign

TVC

• November 29, 2021: Gojek released its first TVC, a 3D “zoom-in” on the X3-standard antibacterial features fitted in every GoCar Protect car. The TVC got an impressive result, generating more than 100 posts about GoCar Protect on social media.
• January 10, 2022: the second TVC launched, with CGI effects, a vivid cyberpunk setting and brand ambassador Sơn Tùng M-TP. This TVC stressed the safe, modern experience that GoCar Protect gives customers.

Pushing PR and fanpage posts

The campaign succeeded in spreading the word about GoCar Protect. The brand appeared again and again in international media (Tech in Asia) and Vietnamese media (Vietnamplus, Tuổi Trẻ, VietnamBiz, CafeBiz and others), alongside funny, viral content on fanpages such as Truyện cổ Remix and Thăng Fly about riding in app-based cars during the pandemic.

Social dance challenge with Quang Đăng

On November 15, 2021, the X3 dance cover challenge with dancer Quang Đăng officially kicked off, and Gojek got the online community to respond and join in.

AR game with Sơn Tùng M-TP

On February 12, 2022, Gojek launched the AR game “GoCar cùng thần tượng” (“GoCar with your idol”), inviting fans to take photos with Sơn Tùng M-TP inside a “virtual” GoCar Protect using an exclusive Facebook filter.

OOH in 2 major cities

Gojek did not skip OOH. To raise awareness of GoCar Protect and ambassador Sơn Tùng M-TP, it placed banners on the busiest roads in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi. The largest banner stood right at the Điện Biên Phủ roundabout (District 1, Ho Chi Minh City) for 8 weeks.

What did Gojek achieve?

GoCar was a new piece of the Gojek ecosystem, but it made a strong debut with users at the end of 2021. With its mission of keeping every ride safe for public health, the campaign achieved wide coverage in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi. 250 posts by KOLs and fanpages mentioning GoCar Protect, with a reach of 555 million, show how well the campaign did. 10 million YouTube views within 2 months confirm it.

The story behind BAEMIN’s food delivery marketing campaigns

BAEMIN: a Korean “unicorn” enters the Vietnamese market

Although it operated in Vietnam for only about four and a half years (June 2019 to December 2023), BAEMIN left behind many memorable marketing campaigns. Founded in June 2010 in South Korea, BAEMIN is a food delivery app developed by Woowa Brothers Corp, with the aim of “helping everyone eat well anytime, anywhere”. In South Korea, BAEMIN is the leading food delivery app, with 69% of the market in January 2022 according to Mobile Index data (The Korea Times, April 2022).

When BAEMIN officially launched in Vietnam in June 2019, right as the food delivery market was heating up, many thought it would struggle to compete with big names such as GoFood, Now (later renamed ShopeeFood) and GrabFood.

From the start, though, BAEMIN positioned itself as more than a food delivery brand: it set out to give customers a fun experience that helped them eat well anytime, anywhere. Instead of focusing on promotions, BAEMIN focused on building its presence in the 2 biggest cities, Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi.

Some notable milestones as BAEMIN won over Vietnamese users:

• June 2019: BAEMIN arrived in Vietnam, starting in Ho Chi Minh City.
• April 2020: BAEMIN launched “BAEMIN đi chợ” (BAEMIN grocery) alongside its food delivery service.
• June 2020: BAEMIN officially “moved north” to Hanoi.
• January 2021: “BAEMIN Đi chợ” became available in Hanoi.
• March 2021: BAEMIN landed in Da Nang.
• By August 2021: BAEMIN was present in 8 major cities across the country, including 5 centrally governed cities (Vietnam’s top tier of municipalities).

What made BAEMIN’s food delivery marketing strategy different?

Even with about 9 years of operations in South Korea behind it, BAEMIN was very careful when it entered a new market. Its campaigns worked so well because the brand aimed squarely at what mattered to customers. Specifically:

Focus on the user experience

Ordering food for delivery only became common in Vietnam fairly recently. More than 60% of diners prefer to eat at restaurants and street stalls, and Vietnamese people care more about quality and variety than convenience.

For customers who do rely on delivery, however, fast delivery is the top criterion. Most busy people expect to get their food quickly so that it keeps its quality and flavor.

For that reason, the app kept learning and changing to meet the needs of Vietnamese users. BAEMIN’s ads did not speak directly to customer needs such as “what should I eat today?”, or push promotions. They focused on making customers feel that eating was both tasty and fun.

Winning customers one cluster at a time

BAEMIN did not go after a mass audience. It took over small clusters one at a time, based on location and user preferences.

BAEMIN’s goal was to be number one in a district and win over both buyers and sellers in that area. That is how the marketing strategy called “Quán ngon quận mình” (“Great eats in your district”) was born, with a message that brought together the best places to eat in each district and focused on fast delivery within the area.

BAEMIN chose inner-city districts for this campaign. Its target audience was the dense population there, including large numbers of busy office workers and young people looking for new experiences. Focusing on the inner city also helped BAEMIN keep delivery times short.

When ordering food online, most users prefer places that are close by, cook quickly and do not keep them waiting long. Some even say that because they want to eat right away, they do not want delivery time to get in the way.

To make the campaign a success, BAEMIN put real care into everything from the design to producing videos about the signature dishes of each district and area, as well as running ads on social media and OOH.

After the success of “Quán ngon quận mình”, BAEMIN went after customers’ food preferences. Specifically, it built food collections, grouping dishes into categories that suited different customers.

You could “Thử chút Healthy” (“Try something healthy”) if you were vegetarian or went to the gym, or browse the “Ngọt” (“Sweet”) collection to find cakes and ice cream. Thanks to these dedicated collections, BAEMIN reached a fairly high Virality Score (0.82).

Focusing on niche markets was the strategy that gave BAEMIN a successful start when it entered Vietnam.

Working with influencers and KOLs

For “Quán ngon quận mình”, BAEMIN cleverly partnered with comedian Trấn Thành on the video “Phụ nữ nên yêu an toàn hay yêu thú vị” (“Should women choose a safe love or an exciting one?”). Its mix of musings about love and food is what made viewers enjoy this collaboration.

In April 2020, the campaign “Ăn ở nhà cũng ngon” (“Eating at home is tasty too”) officially launched, and the hashtag #AnOnhaCungNgon was widely used as Vietnam entered its first round of social distancing. The community embraced “Ăn Ở Nhà Cũng Ngon” with real enthusiasm. Influential food bloggers such as Nofoodphobia and Ăn Sập Sài Gòn, together with big F&B brands such as Runam Bistro and Phúc Long, joined forces to spread BAEMIN’s message to millions of customers.

For the “Thử chút Healthy” campaign, BAEMIN worked with several KOLs, including Châu Bùi, Helly Tống, Emmi Hoàng and Hana Giang Anh, and got a positive response. BAEMIN chose these KOLs because they are celebrities known for a green lifestyle who care about health, the environment and sustainability, and who fit the “clean living, eat clean, go to the gym” standard BAEMIN had set.

Trend-driven content that lets Gen Z get creative

BAEMIN’s target audience was young people who were likely to use food delivery apps often. This group is also hard to reach and hard to keep, and a brand has to be creative and keep reinventing itself to win them over.

That is why BAEMIN turned to KOLs and ran promotions with trend-driven content to attract young people. The 12 zodiac signs, April Fools’ Day, Halloween, Ghost Month, Vietnamese Teachers’ Day on November 20, Black Friday, and catchphrases like “mãi bên nhau bạn nhé” (“let’s stay together forever”) and “nghe vũ trụ mách bảo” (“the universe told me”) are phrases and themes Gen Z knows well, and BAEMIN’s team used them in cute, creative ways.

BAEMIN also redrew characters from hit films in the style of its mascot, Mèo Mập (the Chubby Cat), which made a strong impression on young people.

Not skipping music marketing

Music marketing has long been fertile ground where brands and artists can get creative and spread their image to the public. Lately it has become an advertising trend regardless of a brand’s industry or target audience.

BAEMIN joined in too. To make use of music marketing, it released 2 music video ads and 1 storytelling video:

• Quán ngon quận mình: Trấn Thành x Baemin (May 20, 2020)

• Em bé: Amee x Karik x Baemin (September 20, 2020)

• Ngọt: JustaTee x Rhymastic x Baemin (April 16, 2021)

BAEMIN’s music video ads quickly made it into the trending charts on YouTube and other platforms. Thanks to a message woven in skillfully, a sharp insight, catchy melodies, and careful attention to both sound and visuals, BAEMIN’s music videos were always well received by viewers.

Out-of-home (OOH) advertising

Even though its target audience was young people who use smartphones and spend time on social media, BAEMIN did not skip out-of-home advertising. Starting with the “Món Ngon Quận Mình” campaign, BAEMIN used billboards written in a flirty “pick-up lines for each district” style to attract potential customers.

Lines such as “Tân Bình nhà anh đó, đặt là có anh giao” (“Tân Bình is my home turf, you order and I deliver”), “Anh ở quận 3, em vừa bước ra là anh giao tới” (“I’m in District 3, the moment you step out I’m already there”), “Gò Vấp anh thuộc lòng, em bằng lòng anh giao” (“I know Gò Vấp by heart, just say yes and I’ll deliver”) and “Hoàn Kiếm anh biết rõ, ở trong ngõ vẫn giao” (“I know Hoàn Kiếm well, I’ll deliver even down the alley”) made a big impression on many young people.

BAEMIN’s third birthday campaign to thank its customers

A birthday is usually when a brand puts itself at the center, but BAEMIN saw it differently. For BAEMIN, the brand’s success came from the affection, trust and support of its users. To mark 3 years in Vietnam, BAEMIN launched a campaign to thank its customers. It ran across many platforms, online and offline, to spread the message and reach a large audience.

BAEMIN used outdoor advertising, including billboards, panels and other OOH formats, as well as ads on YouTube and Spotify and posts on Facebook and online news sites, to thank the customers who had stuck with it. On each platform, BAEMIN said thank you in a different way:

• “Thanks for spending a few seconds watching BAEMIN ads every time you stopped at a red light these past 3 years”, “Thanks for telling us BAEMIN drivers are handsome these past 3 years, it made us look good”: messages from the marketing team to passersby on billboards and street panels.
• “On our birthday, thank you for every time you hit Skip Ad these past 3 years, so BAEMIN knows it needs to make better ads”: an upbeat thank-you from a display ad on YouTube.

Brands Vietnam, Cuộc sống Agency and the MoMo e-wallet also reported on BAEMIN’s thank-you message. BAEMIN used almost every platform available for this campaign to deliver its thanks.

Another distinctive touch in BAEMIN’s campaign was the use of handwritten text. To make it feel more genuine, BAEMIN even signed the messages with staff initials, such as “P từ team Design” (“P from the Design team”) and “C. Team Rider BAEMIN” (“C., BAEMIN Rider Team”).

Creativity that defines BAEMIN’s own style

BAEMIN’s birthday thank-you drew a lot of attention and lively discussion, especially among marketers. It was not the first time BAEMIN had surprised the online community with creative, rather bold outdoor campaigns. Before the thank-you campaign, BAEMIN had already impressed users with its “Quán ngon quận mình” OOH campaign, which went viral and drew wide attention.

What we can learn from BAEMIN’s campaigns

Every BAEMIN marketing campaign brought something fresh, appealing and creative. The campaigns showed a youthful spirit that took on difficulties and challenges head-on. That is what gave BAEMIN a clear sense of direction in its marketing strategy.

BAEMIN entered the market late, but its “one cluster at a time” tactic, influencer marketing, music marketing and OOH helped it make an impression on its potential customers.

The marketing strategy that put GrabFood on the map in Vietnam

A successful marketing campaign comes from choosing the right strategy and executing the plan well. GrabFood’s “GrabFood Signatures” campaign in Vietnam (Món “Độc” Quán Quen, roughly “Signature dishes from your favorite spots”) delivered big results in 2019. Using influencers, GrabFood successfully introduced its new segment: signature dishes from the restaurants customers already loved could now be ordered on GrabFood.

The right strategy makes a successful campaign

In May 2019, GrabFood launched GrabFood Signatures to encourage Vietnamese diners to broaden their choice of favorite dishes. The brand used influencers and social media to raise brand awareness and get users to try unique dishes that are hard to find anywhere else. Specifically, GrabFood used an integrated influencer marketing model with 2 main pillars:

• A wide range of influencers

To bring influencer marketing into its communication plan, GrabFood used a wide range of influencers, from celebrities to micro-influencers, bloggers, VJs and more. For example, Linh Ngọc Đàm is known as a popular gamer with 1.4 million subscribers, but she also built her own following by reviewing food.

• Creative content

GrabFood made the most of its influencers’ creativity in several ways. For example, influencers were free to join the campaign and promote it in their own style on social platforms such as YouTube, Facebook and Instagram, to reach the largest possible audience.

What made the campaign work

Once the idea was locked in, it was time for Grab to make a bold move and win over young people. The campaign focused on young people aged 16 to 25+ in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi, and was split into several distinct phases.

Awareness

The campaign started with partnerships with community pages and influencers to carry the message. Linh Ngọc Đàm reached more than 70,000 people through a post on her personal page. The community also varied the content in many forms, posting videos and funny images paired with trendy catchphrases to reinforce GrabFood’s position as a “food expert”. GrabFood also designed gift boxes and sent them with event invitations to more than 50 influencers, to spark curiosity and draw the audience’s attention through posts about the gifts tagged #mondocquanquen and #DotimdaurangoaiGrabFood.

Reach

The centerpiece of the campaign was the launch of “Món ‘Độc’ Quán Quen” on May 23, 2019 at SC VivoCity, after more than a year of preparation. The event featured KOLs such as Linh Ngọc Đàm and Jun Phạm, and gave the audience a chance to taste flavors that were familiar yet unique. Influencers and food bloggers also attended, to boost engagement and spread the campaign’s buzz through check-ins and livestreams.

Winning over the audience

To motivate its target customers to seek out more variety and to make them crave these “signature” dishes, GrabFood worked with Dino Vũ, Ăn Sập Sài Gòn and micro-influencers who regularly review food on Instagram. With this format, food bloggers satisfied not only viewers’ taste buds but also their eyes. The campaign positioned GrabFood as a food expert through the richly flavored dishes of Món “Độc” Quán Quen.

What did GrabFood achieve?

GrabFood’s efforts made the campaign a big hit, with impressive numbers:

• More than 1 million video views from food bloggers and social media.
• 282,478 engagements across 3 main channels: forums, influencers and food bloggers.
• 676,279 engagements with food review content from bloggers, and more than 13,000 discussions and comments (more than 80% positive).

With the Món “Độc” Quán Quen campaign, GrabFood established itself as a heavyweight in the food delivery market, with communication that set trends. The lesson from this successful campaign is that an effective campaign does not rest on the idea alone. It depends on the whole process from strategy to execution, along with creative effort and thorough implementation.