Pendragon - Choose Campaign

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The Challenge

The Challenge

Selling cars and after-sales services during a pandemic poses a great challenge – especially as the government advice remained stay at home, and people were, and continue to experience uncertainty regards to their personal finances.

Our brief was to support the sale of used cars and after-sales services by communication that Pendragon brands are here to support in a Covid safe way.

The Insight
A third of consumers value constant access to a private vehicle more than they did before COVID-19, and half say they are open to extending their use of private vehicles beyond traveling in order to connect with the outside world in a safe way, such as for drive-in movies

Research tells us that digital will play an even bigger role in the car buyer purchase funnel and consumers will have higher expectations of brands supporting this post covid-19.

And existing cars have been sat for a while on driveways during lockdown and many people’s working habits have changed meaning they are doing fewer miles. So, getting this audience to recognise the important of regular vehicle maintenance to help keep themselves and their families safe was key.

In both buying and servicing, a next normal seems to be emerging when it comes to how consumers want to buy and organise service their cars. Digital has become even more important along the entire purchase funnel, with half of consumers being interested in online and contactless sales and service. Consumers anticipate increased online ordering of parts and DIY work.

The Solution

Life is about choices – the freedom to do things your own way. Like buying a car from your sofa or the dealership. With all the extras – in ‘your’ colour, delivered to your door, either just for you or with room for the entire family including the dog!

We dramatised Pendragon’s proposition of ‘Your Car, Your Way’ with a treatment that can be easily adapted to any of their B2C brands. Carrying multiple messages about the choose inherent in each stage of the car buying journey – from arranging finance and delivery to booking an after-sales service.

The campaign launched in October and was updated for the winter months promoting the benefits of staying home in cold weather. We created digital assets including digital banners, YouTube ads and ear-catching radio.

The campaign visual treatment shows that through the lens of their devices, Pendragon customers are free to CHOOSE whatever they want, how they want, from wherever they feel comfortable doing it. It’s ‘Your Car, Your Way’ after all.

Results

The digital campaign drove over a quarter of a million responses, beating industry benchmarks of CTR (1.73% against 0.79%) in some media.Driving quality leads to Pendragon’s website.