As a late entrant to the digital assistant category, Google Assistant had to catch up to first-to-market competitors with actively growing user bases, existing market share, and an already well-established brand presence. While consumers were familiar with brands like Siri and Alexa, Google needed to introduce its digital assistant, teach people why it is the most helpful on the market and convey why it is the next must-have Google product.

Our goals were to drive unaided awareness, increase usage and change consumers' perceptions of the Google brand itself, moving from not only getting answers from Google Search to also getting things done with the Google Assistant.

We created an anthemic campaign line: “Make Google do it”, which was bold in both its language and design, intended to create a clear, confident momentum for the entire Google Assistant platform.

We focused our creative on everyday moments of need for hands-free help as we wanted consumers to understand how voice-first technology could fit into their everyday lives. And we didn’t want to paint a picture of the perfect life, so we reflected the fact that life can be a little messy, allowing us to showcase the benefit of Google Assistant in a relatable way.

We launched in the US, and shortly after, we scaled globally, rolling out our brand anthem across 9 other countries. We amplified our messages through star-powered partnerships, tapped into big media moments, and showcased creative across both high profile mediums as well as much more bespoke messaging in digital and social.

We began by conducting research on the digital assistant category, in an effort to understand how people perceived them. We found that while people were interested in the potential benefits digital assistants could provide, they weren’t familiar with this new way of interacting with technology. However, one thing was clear: In our increasingly busy lives, everyone could use a little hands-free help.

Though we were excited to showcase the ecosystem of Assistant-supported devices, we also leaned into our availability on Android devices worldwide, highlighting that Google Assistant can help users as part of their busy lifestyles on the device that is carried with them everywhere.

In the marketplace, we showed up during high profile times with TV commercials during big media moments and iconic out-of-home in each market. We extended the campaign through social, created activations with live audiences, and supported the campaign with contextual messaging in digital.

We launched a multi-wave campaign in the US, first landing the message "Make Google do it" and then focusing on key use cases across devices. Meanwhile, we scaled our efforts to nine other key markets: India, Japan, Korea, Indonesia, the UK, Germany, France, Italy and Brazil.

In order to create an impact on a global scale, we needed to be relevant to the individual countries and cultures we were speaking to, so we tapped into local insights like Panag cuisine (eaten with one’s hands) in Indonesia, for example.

We leveraged big media moments like the NBA Finals and the World Cup in France. We took over high-profile out-of-home sites in each market, made TV commercials featuring local and global stars, and extended the campaign across digital and social platforms. We even created unique activations like a Google Assistant-enabled Haunted House in Japan.

By the end of 2018, we had built an integrated campaign unique to each market. The campaign drove 25% total market growth, up to 15 points unaided awareness across markets, and saw over 2 billion video views worldwide. However, most notably, we successfully sent one clear message across the 10 different countries: Make Google do it. And by doing so, we created a brand presence that was unmistakably Google Assistant.