2. Introduction
Marketing Communications Manager
Maserati North America
Joseph
Barbagallo
• Responsible for all consumer facing brand communications
and media buying and planning for Maserati North America
• Nearly 10 years within the automotive industry
(client and agency side)
• Primarily digital experience
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3. Why are we here?
To share how Maserati North America leveraged Facebook’s
advertising solutions to drive early awareness, consideration and
purchase intent for the all-new Levante SUV while navigating the
challenges of low brand awareness, limited budgets, limited assets,
scarce digital tools and a highly competitive landscape.
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4. Maserati History (1914-Present Day)
December 1st, 1914 – 4 of the 7 Maserati
brothers (Alfieri, Ettore, Ernesto and
Bindo) start Maserati S.p.A.
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6. Maserati History (1914-Present Day)
In the late 40’s, Maserati
needed a means of funding their
racing program. So, they
introduced their first road car,
1947 Maserati A6 1500.
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9. Levante: The SUV Opportunity
SUV Marketplace is 4x larger than any of the
current Maserati segments
Total Luxury sales projected to increase through
2020 while industry is flat to declining
Source: IHS State of the Automotive Industry Presentation at “The Drive” Conference
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10. Luxury Automotive Shoppers – Behaviors
Are open to change but yet don’t know what vehicle is best for them
Source: ComScore 2016: Path to Purchase among luxury car buyers
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56%
Switched Brands
89%
Compared More
Than One Brand
60%+
Know what vehicle they want after 4
weeks of shopping
11. Source: ComScore 2016: Path to Purchase among luxury car buyers
Online video is the most influential channel for luxury vehicle shoppers.
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Luxury Automotive Shoppers – Influences
12. Source: TNS 2016: Auto Path to Purchase, US luxury car buyers / ComScore 2016: Path to Purchase among luxury car buyers
of Luxury Buyers used their
mobile phone to research online
68
Mobile device is critical to their research process
%
Luxury Automotive Shoppers – Mobile Tool Usage
13. Digital & Dealer Experiences Drive Consideration
Source: Google/comScore The Role of Digital and Dealers in the Luxury Path to Purchase
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Digital and Dealer experiences are
most influential sources in the
buying process for luxury shoppers.
Luxury Shoppers
15. 15
Capitalize on Momentum following Global and Local Reveals
Source: Google Trends of Worldwide Searches for ”Maserati Levante”
With significant interest around the Levante following the Global Reveal, what opportunities can we take
advantage of to build demand…
February-March 2016: Online reveal led to
highest peak in searches one week before
vehicle revealed at Geneva"
March 2016: Geneva Motor
Show vehicle revealed
April 2016: NY Auto
Show, US Reveal
17. 17
Results
People reached across both
4 Million
Engagements at a 13.2% Engagement Rate
1.23 M
Over
1MillionVideo Views
Over
21kGenerated Leads
Levantes Sold through Generated Leads:
127
19. 18
Leading with Branded
Video created intrigue
that drew the consumer
through the full funnel
Balancing Scale while
Driving Efficiencies
against best performing
audiences
Continual Testing and
Optimizations across
various creative
combinations
Establish direct connection
between FB and CRM
system to pass leads to
dealers in real-time
Key Learnings
First Party Data
delivered most efficient
lead conversion
20. 19
Continued Evolution
1. Led Gen campaigns have expanded to other carlines
and continue to drive most efficient CPL’s
2. Take the full funnel approach to Facebook Canvas units
with richer experiences
3. Optimize between Facebook and Instagram to drive
most efficient CPL’s
Evolution
To understand where we are today as a brand with the launch of the Levante, it’s important to learn where we’ve been. Maserati was created by the four Maserati brothers on Dec 1st 1914 with the sole premise of building race cars to win races.
It’s sole purpose was to win races. It won in it’s first race, the 1926 Targa Florio.
Their business model needed to change to fund their passion. This passion became instrumental to their ethos and core to the Maserati DNA.
Today, we are at a very similar point in time with the introduction of the Levante. With the need to continue to fund the “dream” of producing some of the most emotional cars on the road today. The opportunity in tremendous and the time for Maserati is now.
The success of this brand rides on the laurels of this car where Levante will make up nearly 50% of the total volume of sales for 2017. To say this SUV is critical to the brand’s future is an understatement. Let’s take a little closer look at the opportunity within this segment.
Opportunities w/ Levante
First chance at a true two-car Maserati driveway (current clients) and conquest new clients. We’re a brand that is 70-80% conquest.
With Levante, we have a chance to reach a new audience of customer that the brand never has before – new clients (conquest) where 3.8 avg cars considered among luxury buyers
As marketers, it’s our job to drive influence. Let’s look at what channels drive INFLUENCE among luxury car shoppers.
If you looked at this slide 7/8 years ago, you may have seen OEM/dealer sites rank much higher. In today’s non-linear shopping world, it’s a very different situation.
9 out of 10 US Luxury Car Buyers, say Online Video informed or influenced their most recent vehicle purchase.
57% of Luxury Buyers say online video introduced them to new vehicles they had not considered before.
69% of Luxury Buyers say online videos convinced them to think more positively about a vehicle brand. Control YOUR message.
60% of all online video is exclusively consumed on a mobile device.
The mobile device is a critical tool in the decision making path to purchase
Connect Tier 1 level to Tier 3 and connecting the dots for consumers.
Dealer locator
Inventory
Leads
Mobile site being HTTPS enabled so it is aware of the user’s physical location
As marketers we must connect the Tier 1 – Tier 3 bridge digitally. That hand off must be frictionless and positively additive to the consumer journey.
Look at some of the challenges we faced at Maserati, when preparing for the critical launch of the Levante.
- Majority of website traffic comes from mobile with low conversion rate.
- Directive that MNA and agency partners we’re operating on: develop a pre-launch/long-lead program where we can be positively disruptive, efficient in our media buy, by-pass the website and ensure that we made the right audience aware of the Levante.
To make sure that the campaign we developed was as impactful as possible, we had to get the timing right. We played off the highest level of organic awareness that we could.
We needed a long lead strategy that capitalized on the massive interest in the US for this SUV, 6 months out from its retail release. Late April was our moment to begin.
With Facebook, we created an inherently mobile, frictionless experience of generating handraisers in an extremely efficient manner and immediately connected them with dealers to begin ordering a Levante.
Let’s take a look at the results.
Best creative is nothing without the right targeting: (1st party (website visitors, website visitor LALs, customer data, customer LALs) and 3rd party Polk data in/near market for luxury SUV with HHI layers
Cost-per-lead of $4.21 (Next best channel CPP Lead is Retention at $760/lead or 180x higher than this program)
Social commerce, for auto, is now!
Learnings include:
Leading with video is critical in breaking through the clutter in-news feed and being remembered and valued.
Test, learn, optimize. Trial and error mentality. Digital, specifically Social, allows us to do this at low cost and low risk.
Your 1st Party data is critical. These are people who are already buying your cars or showing signs (website LAL) of interest! For MNA, Owners LAL’s were the top performing audience with the most leads generated at the lowest CPL (-26% CPL than campaign average).
Second best performing target was the LAL audience built off of those who visited the “Stay in Touch” page on Maseratiusa.com. Generated the second most leads and second lowest CPL
Video Viewer retargeting, which had minimal spend against it, delivered the third most efficient CPL, just slightly lower than the campaign average
Be engaged with your community. These are people whom are seeing your ads and could buy your product asking questions related to their shopping process.
Connect your CRM system with FB directly to create a seamless pass of that lead to your dealer in real-time.
- We’ve extended Facebook lead gen into Ghibli and QP carlines and are using mixed placement lead ads to drive most efficient cost pers
- We’ve built a full-purchase funnel experience in Facebook Canvas (awareness, consideration, purchase intent) Believers in native advertising and richer digital experiences, Canvas was a logical next step.
We’re continuing mixed placements across facebook and instagram in everything we do on these platforms to drive to most efficient cost pers.
In short, Social Media channels will continue to be part of our staple diet at MNA. We will continue to leverage the FB and IG platforms to reach our audiences with the full funnel objectives of driving awareness, consideration and purchase intent at extremely efficient costs.