Campaign Overview
Porsche spent about $40 million on domestic measured media in 2007 and $30 million in the first nine months of 2008. In contrast, top U.S. automotive marketer General Motors Corp. spent $1.6 billion in U.S. measured media for the first 9 months of 2008. The Porsche mobile campaign was inspired by company research that revealed potential Porsche customers thought the car’s sticker price and ownership costs were higher than they really were.
Campaign Objectives
Porsche viewed mobile marketing as an cutting edge opportunity to reach its technologically savvy and connected consumers anytime, anywhere.
Marketing Tactics
Porsche created the “I Can” campaign with straightforward messages, “You can own one, click to see how” and “Can you afford a Porsche? Just say “I can.” The mobile campaign targeted mobile consumers on Weather.com and Yahoo, including news, finance and sports, represented about 10% of the total digital budget, which allocated 70% to online display ads and 20% to search.
When mobile consumers clicked through, they arrived at the “I Can” mobile WAP site and could view various Porsche models and prices. The campaign mobile reporting and analytics revealed weekend traffic spiked, suggesting mobile consumers interacted well with the brand while out shopping or test-driving vehicles. Porsche wanted to grab consumer attention in the shopping process and the target demographic; mobile provided the opportunity.
Results
Marketing luxury vehicles with starting prices around $45,000 seems adverse on a mobile platform where games, ringtones and wallpaper are often popular. Communicating a similar message as another great marketer, President Barack Obama, Porsche’s “I Can” mobile campaign turned out to be a huge success. The Porsche “I Can” mobile campaign delivered 22% of the entire digital campaign traffic and a click-through rate six times better than online-display advertising. Mobile provided three times better volume to Porsche’s call center than online and twice the amount of dealer location look-ups. Given these figures, the mobile component was also integrated near the end of the 18-month-long affordability campaign determined to quash misconceptions the German-made sports car was over priced and out of reach.
The “I Can” mobile site had 40% higher visit rates to the model-pricing sections, compared to online. In the 4 month long pilot campaign, mobile outperformed Porsche’s wider campaign to convince buyers it wasn’t just an unaffordable icon. The final engagement metrics, Porsche indicated it was would likely allot more of the digital budget for future campaigns and increase promotion run-time. Based on the “I Can” promotion, Porsche plans to launch additional mobile campaigns this Spring for the new Cayman and Boxster models.
Related articles:
Msgme Campaign Spotlight: BMW X6 Sport Activity Coupe
Best Practices: Mobile Politics 2008: Barack Obama Leads
For more information on interactive text and voice mobile marketing and WAP campaigns, please contact your account manager or sales@msgme.com.