WHAT WE DID
We orchestrated a month-long social media campaign that culminated with a live, and online streamed unveiling of the customized motorcycles at the North American International Motorcycle Supershow.
SERVICES
Campaign strategy
Content production
Social media marketing
Collateral design
Influencer engagement
Event production
Public relations
Inspiration
Campaign Intro Video
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Pfaff Harley-Davidson
Unveiling Event
CASE STUDY
Using Social Media to build excitement and amplify the message of a live event
With iconic marquees such as Porsche, McLaren, Pagani, BMW, and Audi, the Pfaff brand has partnered with the coolest brands and brought them to life for their passionate, enthusiastic customers. Servicing the Greater Toronto Area, Pfaff Harley-Davidson in Richmond Hill, Ontario is the premier Harley-Davidson dealership, representing the strongest, most culturally significant motorcycle brand on the planet.
BRAND CHALLENGE
Pfaff Harley-Davidson wanted to raise their brand awareness, showcase the skills of their staff, and demonstrate how the new 2018 Harley-Davidson Softail line could be customized.
Background
When Harley-Davidson introduced their new 2018 Softail line, it struck a chord with the brand's loyal fans, both positive and negative. To generate excitement for the new motorcycles, create some brand buzz and have some fun too, Pfaff Harley-Davidson divided their staff into three teams, handed each one a new Softail, and had them customize each one to show that, although new, there were a lot of options available to make the bikes unique, something that the outgoing line was well known for. The plan was to display the customized versions at the North American International Motorcycle Supershow.
Ideation
Following discussions with Chris Fox, Pfaff Harley-Davidson's General Manager, we decided to leverage the friendly rivalry between the teams and let it play out publicly on social media with daily updates and photos of the builds as they were happening in order to draw in the audience. We'd then follow that up with a big unveiling event at the Motorcycle Supershow.
Our storyboard had some key concepts to pull it all together:
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Make it fun for the teams participating and the audience.
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Show the builds as they were happening, but not too much. Tease the viewers so they'd come back for more.
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Turn the live unveiling into a must-attend event and encourage social sharing to amplify reach.
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To drive engagement and generate leads, encourage the audience to vote, in-person and online for their favourite bike and incent with a giveaway.
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We used the storyboard themes to develop the design, visuals, and messaging for the campaign.
Creating Content
Pitting the teams against each other made us think of the popular 1980s video game, Street Fighter, and we used that to influence the design of the video we created to introduce the campaign.
We followed the teams as they customized the motorcycles and posted over 90 unique pieces of content including graphics, photos, and video, documenting their progress.
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We featured behind-the-scene photos of the builds, teasing the audience with imagery, showcasing the team members, and had some fun making "trash-talk" videos.
Design
We designed various digital and print assets that were used to promote the unveiling and showcase each customized motorcycle on display. Most fun of all, we designed unique baseball cards that featured a photo of the motorcycles and teams on the front, and "stats" on the back that included a list of modifications and a call-to-action for more info. Over 1,000 cards were handed out to show attendees.
Activation
In addition to the social media campaign that we managed, we worked with the International Motorcycle Supershow organizers to promote the unveiling event on their platforms and during the show. To relate with the audience, we engaged a key motorcycle and Harley-Davidson community influencer to MC the event. Finally, to expand the event's reach we live-streamed the unveiling on Facebook and Instagram.
After the unveiling, team baseball cards were handed out and attendees voted for their favourite custom motorcycle via a custom iPad kiosk app that we designed. Instead of placing the voting iPads in stands, they were hand-held allowing us to engage in one-on-one conversations with the attendees. We captured their votes and contact info adding to Pfaff Harley-Davidson's lead pipeline.
"This campaign garnered a heightened sense of anticipation and excitement around a really cool contest. [Their] ability to bring his strategic vision to life was fun to watch!" – Melanie Somerville, Director of Marketing, Pfaff Automotive Partners.
Results
The online campaign and live unveiling ​generated excitement and as a result developed new relationships and deepened existing ones between the audience and Pfaff Harley-Davidson resulting in increased brand affinity.
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Increased social media channel followers by 15% over the course of the campaign.
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Generated 80K impressions across Pfaff Harley-Davidson's social media channels with well above average engagement rates on Instagram (11.9%) and Facebook (5.9%).
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Over 110 people attended the unveiling event in person during the show and a further 4.3K via the live stream.
560 show attendees voted for their favourite custom motorcycles via the iPad kiosk app.
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Over 1,000 team baseball cards were handed out to show attendees.
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Boosted team spirit and increased employee engagement as a result of the competition.