How do you get people all over the world to talk about trucks?

That was the challenge when Volvo Trucks introduced five new models within 12 months. They wanted to stir up excitement for all their new features, not only among customers, but also among a wide range of influencers.

Like all videos in the Live Test Series, the films had to to work on two levels: Highly relevant for truck buyers – but at the same time spectacular enough to attract a broad audience.

Why? Because truck buyers are surrounded by a lot of influencers. Like drivers, friends and families.

Insight: The most effective way to launch a new truck and reach the core target group, would be to go wide and hit tight. Without a huge media budget for a global advertising in consumer media, viral content marketing and social media combined with PR was the only way.

The idea was to carry out extreme tests of relevant product features, in a live setup, where the outcome could never be guaranteed.

The videos on YouTube were accompanied by ads and followed up by in-depth interviews with the engineers, both in printed and digital form.

One of the tests was also turned into a rich interactive 360° experience.

– The number of followers on Facebook has increased from 16,000 to 330,000.

– On YouTube, the number of subscribers increased from 3,500 to 90,000.

– The number of unique visits to Volvo Trucks' websites in Europe has doubled from just over 175,000 to 350,000 per month.

– The videos have more than 100 million views on YouTube and have been shared nearly 8 million times.

– There have been over 20,000 reports about the videos in the media worldwide.

– It is estimated that this degree of publicity represents 126 million euros (172.6 million USD) in earned media value.

– According to a survey, almost half of the truck buyers who have seen the launch videos say that it is now more likely that they would choose Volvo the next time they purchase a truck.

- 1/3 of the Truck buyers who saw the communication have either contacted a dealer or visited volvo.com to get more information.