The People’s Reviewer
January 5, 2010 by olivia · Leave a Comment
Challenge
Volkswagen wanted people to experience the ’simply effortless’ Tiguan for themselves.
Solution
We decided to use social media to turn ordinary individuals into influential brand advocates, by creating a competition in which we searched for a new kind of car critic - The People’s Reviewer.
Over 1000 people applied via YouTube video auditions and email entries. We selected nine contestants, divided them into three heats, and each was given the Tiguan for a week to try out its features and record a short video review. These were posted on the People’s Reviewer site where the public voted for their favourite. The competition culminated in a final between the winners of each of the three heats.
The journey had us meet some crazy characters and the ultimate winner drove off with the Tiguan. In keeping with the unconventional nature of this social media campaign, Harriet donated her prize to Romanian Relief, a children’s charity. Harriet and our team will be delivering the Tiguan personally in January 2010.
To help the contestants win votes we taught them how to tell their story and generate support using social media tools: Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Flickr. They were a quick study!
This is a real example of a campaign that leverages the power of social media with an off-line experience, whilst being bolstered by a traditional media spend. The People’s Reviewer demonstrated the enormous potential of social media when embraced by major brands, even in these early experimental days. In undertaking the campaign, Volkswagen has broken new ground for the way UK car brands can and will connect with the public.
Impact
- 251,411 site visits
- 6,834 participants (votes, sign-ups, entrants)
- 1,019 entrants
- Over 1,000 followers on twitter
- Over 50,000 video views
- 2.2 million reach through social media [excluding paid advertising figures]
…and one People’s Reviewer
But it doesn’t end there.
The People’s Reviewer has made a star out of our winner and a star out of the Tiguan.
