Recent marketplace challenges – including the global recession, environmental concerns, product recalls and natural disasters – have threatened to take a significant bite out of Toyota’s impressive market share in Australia. But we haven’t built a 28-year relationship with Toyota without learning a thing or two about how to bring their marketing strategy into the experiential realm.
With budgets for traditional marketing activities slashed and the long-standing appeal of a driver’s license fading in the youth sector, GPJ came to Toyota with the idea for a campaign to leverage Toyota’s resilience in the face of flat market growth. To bring back the fun of driving and the sense of adventure it can bring, GPJ took a vehicle with a similarly adventurous spirit, the RAV4, and created an innovative campaign that encapsulated what it meant to Live RAV4Ward for 48 Hours.
This hybrid brand experience united stakeholders, Toyota divisions and consumers through live activations and social media. Over 48 hours, participants would live the RAV experience for themselves through a series of beat-the-clock and competitive challenges for a chance to win a new RAV4. After submitting a video audition piece, contestants were flown to Melbourne to race in zorb balls across the Melbourne Cricket Ground, sumo wrestle at Southern Cross Station, and much more for live crowds of up to 75,000 fans.
Content created in this campaign, including three “webisodes,” was driven online, extending Toyota’s digital footprint with 1M impressions on Facebook and 130,000 views on YouTube. A compelling brand-side experience was brought to the consumer through every channel possible – 529,371 in-person, nearly 2M reached through the TV coverage of the event and over 4M in reach for the three webisodes. RAV4 demonstrated that it’s up for anything – not just a day ride with the kids, or a surfing trip, but a spectacular, seat-of-your-pants adventure.
