Proton Exora "What's The Nation's Next MPV Called?" Campaign

Campaign Title: Proton - What’ the nation’s next MPV called? 

Brand Name: Proton Exora

Campaign Duration: September 9 2008 to 30 September 2008

Advertiser (Company Name): Proton Holdings Berhad

Type of Product or Service: MPV

Campaign Summary

PROTON, Malaysia’s national car manufacturer was planning to launch its first multi-purpose vehicle (MPV) by 2nd quarter of 2009. Proton knew that the competition is fierce as there were various foreign car brands offering Multi-purpose vehicle in different price range. The most shocking news for Proton came in July 2008 when Perodua, Malaysia’s leading car seller and Proton’s direct competitor in terms of pricing announced that it is launching a multi-purpose vehicle sometime in 2009. 

Proton needed to react fast to ensure that Perodua doesn’t benefit from launching the car first. With a USD40, 000 budget and with limitations of not being able to reveal the MPV or any of its selling proposition, a campaign was developed to create noise to occupy consumers mind in the MPV segment before Perodua does.

The campaign was such a success that within 6 days, 728 bookings were made despite not revealing any pictures and specs of the MPV.

Marketing Challenge and Objectives

Proton’s plan to launch its first multi-purpose vehicle (MPV) by 2nd quarter of 2009 was already in the pipeline when Perodua, the market leader and Proton’s closest competitor in terms of pricing and volume, announced that it is also launching its first MPV in early 2009. In a highly competitive mid range car market, a late entry into the market means that half the battle is already lost. 

The brief came from the client as early as August 2008. The objectives of the campaign were:

• To build awareness that Proton will be launching its MPV soon. 
• To delay consumers purchase until Proton’s launch.

Since the MPV was still under development, the biggest challenge was to introduce the MPV to Malaysians without any product image or information. Also, this campaign was not in the client’s marketing plan earlier and hence the budget was only less than USD40,000.

Target Markets

Malaysians have been in a progressive mood since the launch of the “2020 Vision to become a developed country” by the nation’s 4th Prime Minister Datuk Seri Mahathir Mohamad. Currently still a developing nation; Malaysians are patriotic when it comes to participating in the nations achievements. Malaysians are proud to be in this train where the nation is in full gear to become fully developed.

When the campaign was launched, it was targeted at the mass Malaysians from the age of 18 onwards. Even though the MPV is targeted at replacement car buyers with families, we wanted all Malaysian to be part of this history. 

Strategy

Without any product information in hand, it was impossible to develop a campaign that communicates through the product; a different route that does not involve any selling proposition was taken.

We saw an opportunity as none of the Malaysian car makers have developed an MPV before

The strategy was to involve and mobilize Malaysians to be part of Malaysian history and its latest achievement– producing its first home grown MPV. The campaign aims to occupy a space in consumers mind by getting Malaysians involved in the process of the achievement

Up till the date of the campaign, the MPV’s name has not been confirmed. We saw an opportunity to get Malaysians involved in the process right from the start of this achievement by aptly inviting them to name the MPV.

With a limited budget, a contest called“Naming Malaysia’s first homegrown MPV” was born. 

A call-for-entry campaign was launched, inviting fellow Malaysians to name Malaysia’s first homegrown MPV. Due to limited media budget and to make it easy for Malaysians to participate, the contest submission was conducted via SMS and online entry.

The execution was focused only on press ads, web banners and a microsite.

The best name with the best rationale selected becomes the first Malaysian to own this brand new MPV from PROTON.

Campaign Results and Measurements

The nation’s first MPV created much noise in the market:

• One  unique name for PROTON’s first MPV was chosen – Proton Exora
• An extremely successful campaign with a total of 251,763 entries received (210,724 via online submission; 41,039 SMS entries). This is 151% more than the target of 100,000 entries.
• 728 bookings within 6 days it was opened for bookings without revealing any product image or info and with a RM1000 booking fee.

(Source: Proton Holdings Berhad Internal Tracking)