The small car space is cluttered with brands fighting to bring out the latest tech feature to stay ahead. Gesture control technology, IOT automatic tyre pressure monitoring…bullet proof space glass.

And Suzuki's lowest selling car, the Suzuki Baleno didn't have anything remarkable to talk about at all.

Problem was, that Suzuki's number one seller in Australia, The Swift, was suffering from stock shortages. Unlucky for us, we had to sell Baleno's or we wouldn't sell very much at all.

So.... how does Suzuki, a brand known for producing no nonsense cars with just the features you need (to keep costs down) compete?

Well, they don’t. They ridicule.

Introducing the new Suzuki Baleno Dastalkomobile.

We launched a ‘slightly updated’ Baleno with the most incredible and ridiculous feature of the year.

One we have waited decades for…and one brands have spent millions pursuing.

The Talking Car.

And Suzuki gave this upgrade away for free with every Baleno, because truth is, it only cost us a few bucks.

Turns out, giving the car a voice, gave people something to talk about.

And we didn't just settle at achieving speech in a car. Sorta.

We made what the car had to say funny, surprising and entertaining.

While the campaign deliberately set out to ridicule the car category obsession with gimmicks and nick knacks, it turns out that gimmicks done right, can actually work!

Using advanced birthday card technology, the Baleno was finally able to bridge the divide between man and machine, and speak, hilariously, ridiculously and incessantly.

Practically, we took light sensor talking birthday card systems, put them in tiny little boxes, and created audio content for each of four places in the car: the glove box, visor, centre console and boot.

This 'upgrade' was then advertised through a multi channel campaign led by TV, Digital, Outdoor and Radio.

We successfully proved that Suzuki don’t do gimmicks.

And never will.

Until now.

Here’s a few stats the campaign period:

- Baleno sales tripled in the first month and maintained at a 200% increase for the next six months

- UVs to the Baleno product page shot up 193% over the same period.

- As did dealer walk-in enquiry which shot up 73.5% year on year too.

- 1006 Talking Car upgrades were fitted (until we ran out)

Just to recap: we increased sales of $16,000 cars by 300% with a gimmick that cost just a couple of bucks.