• by Susie Lyons , June 3, 2015

Category: Media Innovation- Existing Channel

Client: Volkswagen of America

Agency: Deutsch LA

Title: Find a Match

Challenge: Car buyers today arm themselves with as much information as possible before visiting a dealership. The average shopper consults more than 10 sources of information when looking for a new car, and third-party sites like Cars.com, Edmunds.com, and TrueCar.com have risen to meet the need. 

This change in behavior has diminished the role that car manufacturer websites play in the shopping process, leaving them with a dwindling number of opportunities to reach, inform, entice, and ultimately sell a vehicle to these better-prepared shoppers. 

All this meant that vw.com needed to work harder. Built on an outdated global platform, vw.com was similar to any other auto manufacturer site. It was basically a brochure that provided a simple set of tools to help shoppers to learn about VW models, but it did little to advance them in the shopping process.

We had three strategic challenges:

• Make vw.com relevant to shoppers

• Make the shopping process more seamless

• Familiarize shoppers with the VW model lineup

Through research we learned that 79% of the time people were coming to vw.com to use the shopping tools. The problem was that people don’t shop for cars the way that auto manufacturers organize their websites. On most OEM sites, shoppers are forced to sift through loads of industry jargon — like “Convenience Package” or “Equipment Group 300A” — to make sense of what’s being offered. Key filtering criteria is typically limited to model and trim information. But people don’t shop according to model trims like Jetta S or SEL. They shop for the attributes that are important to them, like vehicle color, sunroofs, or heated seats. At the time, no OEM offered a solution to this.

Finding a car was a disconnected two-step process. First, you created the car of your dreams using a builder tool. Then you tried to find it nearby using the inventory search tool. The problem was that the builder and inventory tools didn’t talk to each other, so the results of your inventory search almost never matched the exact vehicle you just built. Building a car that doesn’t exist (or only exists at a dealership across the country) doesn’t get you any closer to the right car. 

Solution: That’s how we came up with our big idea: Turn VW.com into a dating site for cars.

Online dating is about picking the criteria that matters most to you in order to find someone to meet, nearby. The new VW.com lets you find the car of your dreams by searching real local inventory, just like a dating site.

Results: Objectives & Performance 

(We tracked performance by comparing site activity from Aug. ’13 and Aug. ’14)

• Connect shoppers with actual VW inventory and help them learn about our model lineup, measured by:
• New Car Inventory Searches: +60% YoY

• Make it easier to engage with shopping tools, measured by:
• Payment Estimator Tool Usage: +10% YoY
• “Find a Dealer” Searches: +15% YoY

• Move user through to the latter stages of the shopping process
• Dealer Lead Submissions: +5% YoY
• Dealer Site Handoffs: +25% YoY 

Nargis Khanmohamed co-authored this Effie-winning case study. 

Effie Awards are known by advertisers and agencies globally as the pre-eminent award in the marketing industry and recognize any and all forms of communication that contribute to a brand's success. Gold, silver and bronze Effie winners will be announced at the 47th annual North American Effie Awards gala on June 4 in New York.