In Australia branded entertainment content is a growing area. However, entertainment is the key word. Australian consumers are advertising and media savvy and will not engage with anything that doesn’t engage them.

The key thing is to convince clients that entertaining comes first and selling has to be very subtle (if not negligible). This is especially true of insurance marketing, where there’s a history of boring, dry safety content being created that doesn’t attract a mass audience, nor encourage repeat viewing. We saw a massive gap and opportunity for our client in gaming, if the idea was executed in a truly entertaining and engaging way.

Creating a car from the parts our competitors don’t cover, was completely different for the usually boring insurance category and was strategically done to get attention. In the lead up to building our car, we used the uninsured parts in our TV, Radio, press, digital and outdoor, creating awareness of the problem. QR codes on press and outdoor sent users a list of parts on their own cars that weren’t covered by their insurer. We hung actual car parts from the ceilings in shopping malls. We had opinionator adshels asking people to vote on their favourite parts. We put a fully functioning car stereo in a bus shelter for consumers to control with their mobile phones. Each execution led people to our website, where they could guide our mechanics building the car. For those who couldn’t experience the finished car first hand, we created the world’s first motion activated adshel.

In its very first week the Car Park Challenge became the number 6 app in the Australian iTunes store and since its launch there has been over 200,000 downloads.

That’s 200,000 consumers exploring our comprehensive car insurance policy, as the game lets them experience just how important it is to be properly covered.

To put that in context, that means we exceeded the original target by almost 1000%. All achieved without any paid media.