This case study was submitted by Georgie Summerhayes of Brand New Alliance. To submit a case please email [email protected] for the guidelines.

Background

BMW needed to relaunch the 1 Series into the Australian marketplace
after a soft launch in 2007. They wanted to excite ‘hot urbans’ which
was the segment that was most likely to purchase, and had significant sales
targets.  

A new TVC from Germany, developed for the relaunch, was designed to
instil more excitement and awareness in the 1 Series but the music on
the TVC needed more energy for the Australian market. Badjar Ogilvy,
the above-the-line agency for BMW asked Brand New Alliance
(BNA) for a strategy around what could be done with a change in music
and a plan to illicit more engagement with the audience through this
new music.   

Campaign: BMW: Are you the one

Client: BMW Australia

Agency: Brand New Alliance

Objectives

Objectives for the campaign were to:

• Create an opportunity for BMW to connect with the Hot Urban market on their terms and on multiple platforms
• Create a meaningful ongoing conversation with the BMW brand, and
• Leverage the music used in BMW above-the-line advertising to create more fame for the communications campaign.

Strategy

A strategy was created to ignite the hot urban market by leveraging their interest of Australia’s pre-eminent dance act, The Presets, who were enjoying a rapid resurgence in popularity at the time, and integrating the BMW brand using the music. Awareness, interest and positive word of mouth was generated across multiple platforms through the development of a new music single, new music video and strategic distribution amongst target media outlets as well as influential key opinion leaders.  

Execution

A new single

BNA arranged the remix of the single with a globally respected mixer and DJ from France who could lend that ‘edge’ to BMW through the single. ‘Hot Urbans’ were immediately interested in the project via some seeding through leading music industry site, Inthemix.com.au, and the blogosphere and eagerly anticipated the release as monitored through those forums. Nova put the single on rotation on Nova Nights and developed a promotional partnership with the campaign because of the quality of the music provided and the plan overall. Significant radio play helped the success of the single.

A new video

We asked globally respected animators, Collider, to storyboard their interpretation of the campaign. They produced a new video which included subtle brand references without looking like outright product placement. This is a fine line to tread given the target market and how easily they reject outright brand interruption but we got the balance absolutely right and it was played on every music TV channel in Australia. Dealerships and other digital channels also played it and several international channels were very supportive.

Digital strategy

Blogs, forums, partnerships with Inthemix and Fasterlouder, iTunes release, community playbacks and general lifestyle digital PR stories dominated airwaves over April and May and significantly delivered cut through and media pay back. This was particularly successful following the negotiations to allow the track to be downloaded for free. This negotiation was key to mass uptake.

Live strategy

Dealers had the time of their lives playing the exclusive track in-store, at launches and showcasing the video and integrated communications strategy to the target audience as well as to hot prospects of other ranges.  

The program also included a carefully timed servicing of the track to clubs both in Australia and internationally so that dancefloors around the world were influenced by the BMW single.

Results

The campaign generated significant editorial coverage within relevant metropolitan, regional and industry print publications, 650,000 viewers per week on Channel V “Dance on V” which was run on rotation and achieved significant airtime on Nova Nights in Sydney and Melbourne over a number of weeks.  

The track attracted 293,400 unique viewers on inthemix.com.au (making the track the most blogged track on inthemix.com.au to date) as well as generating huge interest on blogs globally and YouTube.

Leading DJs around the world played the track at clubs and the song reached number 19 on the ARIA Australian Artists Singles Chart.

The BMW in-store experience was transformed throughout the campaign and helped deliver more calls than they have ever had and the resultant test drives resulted in BMW achieving sales in excess of their plan for the launch.

Overall, by using brand entertainment, the campaign resulted in the often difficult to connect to urban target market engaging with the BMW brand in an entertaining and relevant way.