automotive

Dealerships Profit From Nissan Effort

Nissan Rogue

HOLLYWOOD, Calif. -- A digital campaign launched by Nissan for its Rogue was so successful that dealerships were seeing waiting lists for the car -- something they hadn't seen in a while, according to the ad agency behind the effort, which discussed it as a case study at Tuesday's OMMA Global Hollywood conference.

The Nissan Rogue campaign hit the ground running with a series of viral videos dubbed "Maze Master," a quirky wooden tilt-board game, and sponsorship of the "Heroes" TV show, said Kristi Vandenbosch, president at Tequila USA.

The Rogue campaign took consumers through an online journey that resulted in several viral clips. "Maze Master II" showed a close-up of the game on the front seat of a car. The main driver and backseat driver played the game by making hairpin turns in a Nissan Rogue. The turns caused a marble to traverse the maze and drop into the game's holes. The maze tied into a vision of the car driving down city streets surrounded with skyscrapers.

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The campaign's results were so successful they even surprised Vandenbosch, she said. In four weeks, the YouTube videos were viewed more than 200,000 times. Both "Maze Master" videos were seen so many times that Yahoo editors placed them on their front page, and later voted them among the top viral videos.

The term "2008 Nissan Rogue" ranked No. 7 in search on Yahoo in October. In six weeks, the game had been played more than 335,000 times on NissanUSA.com. "Many car dealerships were starting to see waiting lists to buy the car, which they hadn't seen in quite some time," Vandenbosch said.

Nissan and Tequila worked with Electronic Arts to unveil the car in a video game. They also produced a series of episodic videos that were the back story of one of the characters in the game. Six films were distributed on Nissan.com and other channels such as YouTube.

Tequila also took the Z car on tour across the country, stopping at car clubs along the way to let them experience the new 370Z for the first time. A deal with Sports Illustrated put the car in the magazine for a pittance. The videos have been seen more than 800,000 times in the last few weeks. Apps for Apple's iPhone also aimed to lure gamers to the car.

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