2019 Winners & Shortlists

Background.

Chevrolet had recently introduced its first ever all-electric vehicle, the Bolt EV. A lot is riding on the success of this new car, but the truth was that the region wasn’t ready yet to fully embrace electric vehicles. Electric vehicle range anxiety is largest barrier to entry, with people’s greatest fear that of running out of charge in cities where charging stations aren’t a common sight. With class-beating range of 520kms on a single charge, Bolt EV was ready to change perceptions, but how could we communicate this? Making a big bold claim on range wouldn’t be enough to convince the region’s EV-skeptical car buyers. So we decided to not just claim class-leading range, but tangibly demonstrate just how far the Bolt could really go on a single charge.

Describe the creative idea.

To really bring Bolt’s class-leading single-charge range to people’s attention, we created the world’s longest mobile banner – giving users the opportunity to go the full distance themselves. Using innovative Android-based technology, we were able to interactively demonstrate the Bolt EV’s long-range capabilities, designing a mobile experience that challenged mobile users to swipe and drive a virtual Bolt EV down a 520km-long banner until they reached the finish line. Just to put that 520kms into perspective, that’s over 1.9Billion pixels in length (1,965,379,091 pixels to be exact), the equivalent of 626 Burj Khalifas stacked on top of each other.

Describe the strategy.

Range anxiety is the single greatest barrier to electric vehicle adoption, with a third of consumers who say they might buy an EV, wanting a car with 500km range (despite only driving an average of 64km per day).* So we knew demonstrating Bolt EV’s best-in-class 520km range was key to its success in the region. This objective determined both the creative execution and media channel. A 30 minute test-drive wouldn’t be able to truly convey the Bolt’s range in a demonstrable way, let alone a 30 second TV spot or print ad. Our interactive banner allowed users to go the distance themselves and truly appreciate Bolt’s best-in-class range. We were also able to target our banner more directly to those with a higher propensity to purchase electric based on their interest in electric vehicles, green energy and fuel prices.

Describe the execution.

Our banner was flighted for just over 2 weeks, and we had just a limited budget with which to push it. It was therefore even more important to ensure those who engaged with it were kept on long enough to have our message resonate. To do this, we kept the marathon drive interesting with hundreds of Easter eggs scattered across the 520km stretch. These included jokes, motivational shout-outs… and a couple of sneaky jabs at our closest EV rivals stopped along the roadside at their respective range limits.

List the results.

During the 2-week campaign, users spent 852 hours (35.5 days) on the banner and made a whopping 1,525,348 finger scrolls down the road. It took one mobile user six and a half hours of continuous scrolling to reach the end of the banner – no easy feat! (he was rewarded for his effort & dedication) Average time spent on the banner was 8.37 seconds, over 9x the average time a user spends on any banner. Ultimately, our record-breaking banner ad changed both perceptions of the Bolt and consumer behavior: • In a post-campaign survey, those who interacted with our banner were 32% more likely to consider buying a Bolt* • User interaction with our banner directly resulted in 40 footfall leads to Chevrolet showrooms. ******