HYUNDAI 4 SECOND REVIEWS

TitleHYUNDAI 4 SECOND REVIEWS
BrandHYUNDAI
Product / ServiceHYUNDAI VENUE
CategoryB01. Challenger Brand Strategy
EntrantANALOGFOLK Sydney, AUSTRALIA
Idea Creation ANALOGFOLK Sydney, AUSTRALIA
Media Placement HEARTS & SCIENCE Sydney, AUSTRALIA
Production HOOLIGAN COLLECTIVE Sydney, AUSTRALIA
Additional Company ORCHARD Sydney, AUSTRALIA

Credits

Name Company Position
Bill Thomas Hyundai Director of Marketing
Helen Gilmartin Hyundai Brand & Product Marketing Manager
Lisa Yau Hyundai Brand & Product Marketing Specialist
Richard Morgan AnalogFolk Executive Creative Director
Alister McCann AnalogFolk Copywriter
Parisa Rezeai-Abyaneh AnalogFolk Art Director
Carlos Gomez AnalogFolk Copywriter
Robert Carter AnalogFolk Designer
Jonny Sycamore AnalogFolk Group Account Director
Emily Entwisle AnalogFolk Project Director
Matt Robinson AnalogFolk Managing Director
Ben Hourahine AnalogFolk Strategy Partner
Dylan Harrison Hooligan Collective Director
Nicole Richardson - Producer
Jason White - DOP
Joel Eames - 1st AC
Elise Baker - Production Art Director
Mark Parry - Editor

Why is this work relevant for Creative Strategy?

To launch the Hyundai Venue, we challenged every convention in the SUV category and developed a new strategic approach to audience targeting, channel choice and creative development using unique data insights. Our #4SecondReviews campaign for the Venue broke every digital benchmark for Hyundai and produced the most successful launch for them in the Australian SUV market. Our unique creative strategy showed that data can disrupt a market and sell a ridiculous amount of micro-SUVs, with the campaign driving over $12million in Venue sales all from a total investment of just under $650,000. [See information document for full case-study]

Background

Going way back to the original Toyota RAV 4 launch, the SUV has become synonymous with a young male audience, chasing recreation and the Australian desire to get out of the city to explore new terrains. With Australia being one of the largest, most sophisticated and competitive new-car markets in the world we had our work cut out for us when tasked with the launch of the all-new Hyundai Venue in an extremely saturated SUV category. Briefed with driving awareness and consideration for the Hyundai Venue, our goal became clear; challenge the stagnant sector's orthodoxies in ways that our competitors and the category itself could have never imagined. Whilst our competitors spent millions on television campaigns, we had a total media and production budget of $635,000, so we had no choice but to do something completely ground-breaking to drive sales of this new vehicle in Australia.

The Interpretation of the Challenge (30% of vote)

A deep dive into the data revealed a surprising insight that opened up a new target market for us. The average age of the current car buyer is now 40+ in Australia with women largely representing the growth in the category. Our research showed us that the traditional male USP’s of “freedom, recreation and power” didn’t appeal to this group. What they wanted was practical reassurance that they were making the right decision, delivered in a way that was fun and reflected their ‘young-at-heart’ personality. First up we needed a unique proposition for this little SUV and realised that the Venue was an ‘absurdly sensible’ choice for our young-at-heart ladies. Secondly we needed a unique way to reach them which disrupted the way SUV’s were launched in this market, to make the most of our modest budget.

The Insight / Breakthrough Thinking (30% of vote)

Digging into the data we discovered that 73% of new car buyers were now using online research and social media as their primary source of information. Pulling apart this new customer journey, we discovered that 19 of the 24 touchpoints they were using were digital.. With a budget of only $635K to cover everything (in a billion-dollar sector), we made a strategic choice to zero in on one critical touchpoint in particular. One that we thought was ripe for reinvention: Online car reviews. A random selection of online CarAdvice reviews suggested their length could vary from a tiring 2’12” to a mind-numbing 13’35”, with an average length approaching seven minutes. Scientist’s reckon we now have a shorter attention span than a goldfish and yet car reviews, the new online “moment of truth” where new cars get their first real grilling, would test the memory of an elephant.

The Creative Idea (20% of vote)

Welcome to Hyundai Venue 4-Second Reviews. 30 blink-and-you’ll-miss-them, meme-like car reviews, from a range of motoring “experts” – like a time traveller, a flat earther and a cactus, to name a few. Using data to strategically match car features to our audience’s interests, we created engaging, personalised content. So, whether it was short snippets on Instagram, tailored content for YouTube or immersive Instant Experiences on Facebook, our reviews stopped our audience scrolling and caught their attention. To garner some celeb cred, we convinced six of our target audience’s favourite 90's celebrities to come along for the ride, like Cory Feldman, Carson Kressley, Tori Spelling and Lance Bass. The five-month campaign (November 2019 - March 2020) was built around sophisticated audience data analysis, which related each of our reviews to a specific life-stage and lifestyle theme that resonated with our audience, while aligning with an innovative feature of the Hyundai Venue.

The Outcome / Results (20% of vote)

Our #4SecondReviews for the Venue broke every digital media benchmark Hyundai had in Australia. With a small paid media budget of just $360,000, we ended up with over 5 million complete views. We saw a radical increase in time spent on site, with an average of 4.4 minutes on the site compared to the Hyundai website average of 1.5 minutes over the same period. SSOV exploded, tripling positive sentiment towards the brand during the campaign period, which smashed the Australian auto brand average. Advertising recall increased by 58% and amongst the new target audience, consideration of the Hyundai Venue rose by 72%. The campaign ended up demolishing Hyundai’s online test-drive benchmark and delivering the most successful SUV launch for Hyundai in Australia. All up we drove a $12million in Venue sales, all from a total investment of just under $650,000.

Please tell us about the challenger brand and how your campaign challenged / was different from your competitors

This work was a response to a set of unwritten rules that have governed the Australian SUV market for the last decade or more: That SUVs should be targeted at young men with a ‘Freedom, recreation and power’ message delivered via TV advertising. It was time the sector was shaken out of its complacency and many of those assumptions challenged in the face of new consumer realities. Taking a car that was looking to punch above its weight, we made content fit for our newly discovered (and neglected) audience, fit for modern media channels and fit for contemporary car buyers. In doing so we challenged all of those conventions simultaneously and successfully positioned the Hyundai Venue as a challenger brand ahead of its competitors with just a fraction of the budget.

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