When launching any multi-million dollar marketing campaign it doesn’t hurt to see results instantly – it’s every marketer's dream.This is what happened after Volvo hit the start button on its largest major national marketing campaign in a decade.
From day one, the traffic to its website was four times higher than the average day for its site over the last year, and its dwell time doubled, marketing director for Volvo Car Australia, Oliver Peagam explained.
Peagam says this has been a long time in the making, and explains the initial interest hinges more on the product
rather than letting the marketing take all the credit. The product coming to market is the XC90, which launched in the Australian market this month with a major marketing push featuring Swedish DJ Avicii.
“It’s been over a year’s worth of planning locally,” he says. “The car finally got signed off in 2011 and the cars
started being produced late last year, which in terms of manufacturer turnaround, is quite fast.”
For Volvo though, it doesn’t end there. Peagam explained the XC90 is part of a global US$11 billion investment which saw the car manufacturer build a whole raft of new engines as well as a “platform architecture” which will see the business roll out many more cars, both big and small, over the next few years.
“To give you an idea of the product onslaught that’s coming from Volvo in the next few years, the XC90 will be the oldest car in our range within four years,” he says.
To support the launch of the car, Volvo Australia created a campaign featuring both global and local assets in order to get the message out there. The business has also chosen to use a channel mix comprising of above- the- line channels, but with 60% of its spend in digital channels.
While Peagam explains that this isn’t a huge increase in digital spend for the brand, he reveals it is an increase
featuring “not just regular display activity, but also a partnership with Fairfax and also Westfield”.
“Digital at the core, that’s what we’re calling it locally,” he says.
Volvo worked with its creative agency Grey to take global assets and work with them and translate them to work across online as well as with other publisher partnerships. With Fairfax, Volvo is using digital viewer and it’s also working with Westfield’s out-of-home network and utilising its digital inventory as well as putting display cars in some centres.
“There’s a combination of global creative and locally produced assets as well, and we saw that worked pretty well in unison from a global point of view,” Peagam says.
Avicii is the globally ambassador for the roll-out and while on the surface it may seem that he doesn’t fit with the brand’s aim of attracting families and high income earners to this new car, apparently he speaks exactly to Volvo’s target demographic.
“I was quite surprised too,” Peagam says. “Interestingly, the age demographic which mostly downloads his music
on Spotify in Australia is basically 35-49 years old.
“We had a long chat with Universal Music during our campaign perpetrations and we spoke about three to four
months ago ... I had similar questions and I’ve seen these stats with my own eyes,” he says.
“That’s an interesting development in itself – we’re all getting on a bit.”
Volvo isn’t the only luxury car brand to come out with major campaigns in the past few months. Lexus recently built a car with a heartbeat in partnership with its creative agency M&C Saatchi, in order to generate buzz in the market. And it appears to have done just that.
While Peagam admits that it has to keep an eye on the competition, he said at the end of the day the brand has to
run its own race.
“It’s always good to keep an eye on the competition – I think we’d be stupid if we didn’t and I’m pretty sure they’ve got an eye on us – but you have to look at where we are in our particular life cycle and what’s coming with this car and the new cars that are coming globally as well,” he explains.
Peagam does comment, however, that being a car marketer in Australia does come with its challenges purely because of the size of the market.
“In Australia it’s pretty unique. There are 60 odd car brands that are all super aggressive and all trying to get a slice of that new car market. We’re all in it together and it’s about trying to dial up your points of difference,” he says.
“The consumer knows where they’re going to research and the type of car they think they want and it’s up to us to make sure we have the right offering in the right place, and the right audience at the right time.”
According to Peagam it doesn’t just come down to the marketing campaign.
“It comes down to the product, and from a product point of view the XC90, it’s one of the world’s safest cars and we’re dialling up our heritage and DNA of safety and throwing some innovations and world-firsts in,” he says.
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