What auto advertisers need to know to drive campaign results in 2023

On July 7, 2023, the UK automotive industry experienced a milestone event: Ford built its very last Fiesta vehicle in Cologne, Germany

On July 7, 2023, the UK automotive industry experienced a milestone event: Ford built its very last Fiesta vehicle in Cologne, Germany. Why is this particularly significant? Because the Ford Fiesta was the UK's all-time best selling car. And why did Ford stop production of this model? To focus on building electric cars, of course.

The UK auto industry is going through major changes. Electric vehicles, supply chain issues, and automation are all impacting the market. And while UK car sales hit a 30-year low in 2022, the industry is bouncing back with eight consecutive months of growth in 2023.

For auto advertisers, it's crucial to keep tabs on real-time trends and customer behaviors. They can then use this information to build the most effective advertising campaigns for the current moment.

That's where the Taboola Creative Playbook: Automotive comes in. Compiled by the Taboola Creative Shop — a global team of data experts and strategists — the playbook serves up creative trends, tips, and recommendations specifically for auto advertisers. We used natural language processing to analyze data across a network of over 9,000 publishers and 500m+ daily active users, to determine just what types of content are driving engagement and capturing attention.

Ready to shift your advertising campaigns into gear with winning tips and strategies for success?

Here are a few of the top takeaways from the playbook.

Readership trends: electric cars and Formula 1 drive clicks

Let's start with auto readership trends that emerged across Taboola's publisher network. As of July 2023, these content topics were heating up among UK audiences:

• Electric cars and electric vehicles: Pageviews were up 15% in the past 90 days for EV-related content. Readership around these topics should only continue heating up since the UK government announced plans to stop selling new petrol and diesel cars by 2030. Auto advertisers can tap into this engagement by building native advertising campaigns around EV trends and distributing their ads among EV-related articles.
• Motosports Madness: The British Grand Prix race launched on July 9, driving pageviews up 59% in the past 90 days. Content about Australian driver Daniel Ricciardo also jumped 159% in the past 90 days after the news that he unseated Nyck de Vries on the AlphaTauri team. July's Goodwood Festival of Speed, an annual motorsports festival in West Sussex, drove over 623K pageviews in the past 90 days, again demonstrating the hold that motosports have on UK readers. Native advertisers can harness these opportunities to launch timely, event-related campaigns to their audiences.
• Volkswagen and Toyota: Certain car brands took the spotlight among UK readers, including Volkswagen with 1M pageviews (up 146% in the past 90 days), Toyota with 891K pageviews (up 245%) and Kia with 695K pageviews (up 198%). Advertisers such as car resellers can spotlight those brands that are generating high levels of interest in their campaigns to capture attention.

Incorporating these trending topics into marketing materials and campaign creatives can help auto advertisers to capture audience attention and drive clicks.

For example, in response to environmental concerns, Kia launched a native video campaign in the US, showcasing its sustainability and carbon neutrality initiatives. The native advertising campaign resulted in over 170% uplift in unaided brand awareness, and was particularly impactful for a female audience aged 18-54, 26% of whom showed a strong positive affinity for the Kia brand after watching their ad.

Ad image trends: mind your POV

Now let's get into the ad creatives themselves. Based on our analysis of millions of impressions across top publisher sites, auto advertisers can use these ad image tactics to increase engagement:

• Add local elements: If you're targeting audiences based on location, integrate local elements like license plates, street signs, flags, and neighborhood monuments. In one campaign, adding a person holding a local driver’s license increased conversion rate by by up to 15%.
• Showcase license plates: Speaking of license plates, visuals that clearly show these plates tend to drive clicks. For example, you might include a frontal shot of the vehicle with an unobstructed view of the license plate.
• Find unique points of view: Experiment with visuals of car drivers taken from different POVs. For example, from the passenger seat, back seat, over the shoulder, or outside the window.
• Incorporate bold colors: Native advertising visuals with brightly coloured vehicles in red, gold, and blue are proven to grab people's attention and enhance results.

Ad copy trends: focus on pricing and urgency

Put the pedal to the metal with your ad titles and calls to action (CTAs). Use these data-backed tips when crafting your advertising copy:

• Be descriptive: Top titles include positive adjectives and descriptors like “sleek," “incredible," and “redesigned." Use these to keep customers intrigued. For example: “Discover Elegant Vintage Cars For Sale Near You."
• Highlight pricing: Don't shy away from calling out costs — both for expensive cars and deals on affordable vehicles. For example: “People are Snatching These New Minis After Seeing Their Prices."
• Make it urgent: Appeal to shoppers' feelings of FOMO and urgency with terms like "almost gone," "clearance sales," and "selling fast." For example: "Affordable SUVs in [Your City], Selling Fast."
• Invite users to learn more: Boost your advertising clicks with CTAs like "Learn more," "Click here' (best for lead generation), and "Get offer" (best for online purchases).

Landing page best practices: keep it streamlined

Landing pages represent a critical step in the customer journey. Once you've hooked readers in with native ads, you have an opportunity to share more in-depth information and keep them on site.

Just make sure you build well-designed and intuitive landing pages with these key elements:

• Clean and minimal page layout: Make it feel similar to an editorial article with a simple design, like black font on a white background and a narrow text column.
• Efficient content structure: Choose a headline of 10-15 words, and content of 600-1,000 words. Also, break up the page content into one to three subsections highlighting your unique selling propositions (USPs).
• Gamified CTAs: Make the landing page experience interactive with CTAs that point to surveys, quizzes, and forms, like "Select your preferred car model" or "Enter your postcode to find retailers near you." For lead generation campaigns, you might also include CTAs as banners on the shoulders of your landing pages.

Hit the gas on your auto ad campaigns

As the auto industry continues to evolve, advertisers should have the data and tools they need to adapt their strategies accordingly. Especially now that UK car sales are bouncing back and the conversation is shifting to electric, brands must be able to meet customers with relevant content.

The good news is that, with real-time insights to guide them, auto brands can build more engaging and click-worthy ad creatives — taking their ads to the next level.

Ready to hit the gas on your native advertising campaigns? Download the full Taboola Creative Playbook: Automotive for more creative tips and best practices.