Newsworks Planning Awards 2014

Dacia and The Telegraph – June/July 2014

Executive summary

From Germany’s eventual glory to Luis Suarez’ shameful departure, the World Cup party may be over but the memories remain. Brazil 2014 was widely regarded as one of the best tournaments ever on the pitch and through their ever-increasing number of platforms, newsbrands were able to ensure that it was also the most extensively covered World Cup off the pitch too. Newsbrands remain such a trusted environment for sports content so what better time for Dacia to utilise this opportunity to add their own unique perspective on the beautiful game with a tone of voice that only they can deliver.

Background

Since their arrival in the UK in 2013, Dacia has always strived to ‘Break the Rules’ of the more established car manufacturers and have become synonymous with tongue-in-cheek contextual messaging reminding consumers of the unique value proposition their range of vehicles offers. From poking fun at their more expensive rivals to trying to persuade George Osbourne that the £6,995 Sandero is the perfect vehicle for the man who helps Britain avoid unnecessary spending; Dacia are never far away from a tactical opportunity to communicate their anti-frivolity manifesto.

Being such a new brand in the UK, raising brand awareness is a key business objective for Dacia whilst also showcasing and generating leads for the four vehicles that are now available (Dacia launched with just one model – the Duster – in January 2013). With the unique proposition Dacia offers with their range of cars, it is also important that any of their communications reflect positively on the brand so they are perceived as a brand which offers incredible value for a quality product and are by no means cheap. Newsbrands now reach over 20 million people (39%) every day and 35 million people (68%) each week across print and online (NRS PADD 2014) so provide the perfect platform to deliver huge reach to an engaged audience. With the biggest sporting competition in the world taking place this summer, it was a fantastic opportunity to utilise newsbrands huge reach to drive awareness and understanding of Dacia in an environment where the brand could add its unique point of view.

Insight

We have learnt from previous Dacia activity that partnerships are an effective and cost efficient way of reaching the brand’s target audience while also tapping into a particular interest. As Dacia’s primary “savvy spender” audience is predominantly made up of ABC1 Men 45+, we identified through TGI work that that sport in particular is a passion point for these individuals. We also know that this audience doesn’t traditionally respond well to simple brand messaging, where intelligent messaging with facts and insight carries much more resonance. With the eyes of the country on Brazil for the World Cup in June, it

provided us with the perfect opportunity to not only be prominent around a topic with huge interest for our audience but also a rich territory full of dividing opinions and insight.

With the budget we had available, we knew that if we ran a traditional display campaign across multiple platforms we wouldn’t be able to deliver the cut-through and frequency necessary to build brand awareness in what was always going to be a congested market around the World Cup content. The task was complicated further with two of Dacia’s main competitors – Kia and Hyundai – both being official FIFA partners and therefore having a large presence already during the tournament through their association. In order to stand out against the crowd, we knew that any activity we ran not only had to stand out but also be engaging to our audience.

Taking all this into consideration, we decided to partner with a single newsbrand to run a cross platform solution which not only generated huge value to the client, but also allowed us to have a more detailed conversation with our target audience and in-turn offer value to a newsbrand’s own readers. Big-budget ‘showy’ sponsorships aren’t part of the Dacia’s anti-frivolity brand ethos so by partnering with just one newsbrand, we were also able to focus budget and take ownership of a brand’s World Cup editorial, almost hijacking the big money sponsorships undertaken by our key competitors.

The plan

We teamed up with The Telegraph (index at 275 against Dacia’s target audience) for an integrated campaign that ran across all of their platforms as the anchor partner for the newsbrand’s World Cup coverage. Dacia were involved in all of The Telegraph’s World Cup content from being the solus advertiser in the 32 page preview supplement to sponsoring Henry Winter’s World Cup Daily email which was sent out to 50,000 subscribers every day with the latest insight from Brazil. To further engage with our audience, the centre of the partnership was a bespoke football game – The Dacia Daily Brazil Hat-Trick. Readers were challenged to answer three short yes-orno questions on each of the 25 match days with The Telegraph’s editorial team on hand to provide advice and insight (helping you make the smart decision and linking it back to Dacia’s savvy philosophy). The questions were promoted across print, tablet, mobile, desktop and socially and included flashes on the front of the main paper and sports section before the tournament started to encourage competition sign-ups.

The competition ran for the duration of the tournament and concluded with an event at the Dacia dealership in Stoke (near the eventual winner), where the main prize of a Dacia Sandero Stepway was handed over. There was also a Q&A and World Cup wrap-up session with Henry Winter, the chief football correspondent for The Telegraph and England legend Gordon Banks, which Dacia invited customers to attend. In addition to the game, Dacia received extensive display presence across all of The Telegraph’s touch points. This included a 4pp cover wrap on the day of England’s opening fixture against Italy and various desktop and mobile sport HPTO’s on key dates throughout the tournament. Utilising the immediacy that newsbrands can provide, we also ran a number of contextual World Cup display adverts across print, tablet and online where – thanks to the fantastic work by creative agency Publicis - messaging changed to reflect the big stories that developed over the course of the tournament such as England’s disappointing early exit and the infamous Luis Suarez bite incident during the Uruguay v Italy fixture (examples below).

Results

• The combined partnership reached 6.74 million adults, that’s 13.1% of coverage with an average OTS of 6.5

• Against our core audience of ABC1 Men 45+ we reached 1.89 million (27.9%) with an OTS of 9.8. A strong frequency to a core audience across multiple touch points

*Source: NRS PADD – Print & Digital – NRSJan13-Dec13 + ComScore Nov 13

• The 10 Sport HPTOs on desktop on key match dates delivered 3,314,459 impressions, generating 3,265 clicks with a CTR of 0.10%

• There were 613,359 iPad ad impressions served from June 9 to July 13. The ads generated 8,368 clicks (a CTR of 1.36%)

• 1.5 million Henry Winter World Cup Daily emails were sent over the course of the tournament. These had an average open rate of 24% (total of 360,000 emails opened)

The Dacia Daily Brazil Hat-Trick achieved over 2.4 million ad impressions on desktop and 300,000 on mobile. The game generated a total number of 10,884 competition entries throughout the tournament. In addition to this we collected valuable data capture leads for Dacia with 2,858 brochure requests and 485 people asked for a test drive.

As part of the sponsorship package, The Telegraph undertook some independent research measuring the success of the campaign. The campaign delivered some fantastic results on our initial consideration and awareness objectives.

• 60% of those who read The Telegraph’s World Cup coverage recalled seeing the campaign, well above The Telegraph average of 41%

• 35% of those that recalled the campaign recognised that Dacia was the brand associated with the feature against a Telegraph average of 28%

• Those who saw the campaign were 54% more likely to feel positive about Dacia and 19% more likely to consider purchasing a Dacia

• 47% of all those that recalled the campaign acted upon it. From entering the competition to talking about Dacia to friends and family

*Fieldwork dates – 16 to 25 July 2014 – sample size 573

Client view

“The Daily Telegraph provided us with a great platform to talk to our key audience of educated, savvy consumers while the World Cup provided a key event for us to further explain the brand ethos behind Dacia whilst tapping into a key interest of our audience. The frequency and the contextual placement allowed us to get across the simple, honest, down to earth DNA of the brand. Working with our creative agency Publicis, we could also be reactive to the key stories that transpired during the tournament. Talking points such as the Suarez ‘bite’ and England’s untimely exit were opportunities to communicate our view of the things and therefore our identity.”

Ed Preston – brand communications manager – Renault UK

How it looked

Examples of the 25 daily question columns which appeared in print and tablet

Daily Brazil Hat-Trick HPTO on desktop and mobile platforms

Online game hub

Henry Winter’s World Cup Daily emails

Telegraph Sport Coverwrap – 14 June – The day of England’s first game

Dacia Dealer event with Henry Winter and Gordon Banks – 21 September