VW California Ocean: A house for the mobile generation

The Volkswagen California Ocean is the dream camper van, so well-equipped you can practically live in it.

So, to convince Taiwanese men it was worth paying more for, we’d show them that they could by pitching it as the first property they could afford – a mobile mansion for their family.

In a first for a car brand, we sold a van like a house by advertising in local real estate listings, news, and business sites… inviting people to an ‘Open house day’ at our ‘California Mansion’ in downtown Taipei.

Programmatic ads clicked to a microsite, where you could take a video tour of the ‘property’ and learn more.

On the day of our ‘open house’, we asked passers-by to guess the ‘mansion’s’ price – which was much cheaper than most micro-apartments despite being the same size!

We shared reactions on social media, used influencers to chat about campervan life, pushed articles and ads through Yahoo! (Taiwan’s biggest publisher), and targeted car lovers in search.

By completely reframing the product, we made test drives quadruple, and sales more than double, as more Taiwanese asked for the keys to their own ‘California Mansions’!

Results:

14.5 M Ad Views

2.4 M Social Video Views

183 Pieces of PR, Worth $1M

4x Test Drives