Volkswagen “Believes in the Power of Good Content”

‘Chase The Sun’ – created by 22feet Tribal Worldwide, media agency PHD and auto-focused content creators PowerDrift – has rolled out in India to promote its Tiguan range of SUVs. It features a road trip in a Tiguan – driven by PowerDrift co-founder Rohan Abal, accompanied by travel photographer Arjun Menon – to Arunachal Pradesh’s Dong Valley, the easternmost tip of India to capture its first sunrise.

Speaking about the campaign, Volkswagen India’s Head of Marketing, Bishwajeet Samal, said: “Digital is a key part of Volkswagen’s communications strategy in India. The medium allows us the freedom and opportunity to tell the story we want to and emotionalise the brand.”

“We firmly believe in the power of good content. With this film (long format content) we embark on a 10 minute, visually immersive journey of two individuals chasing the first sunrise that India sees. And in the process, we are bringing our product proposition alive. This film has also made Volkswagen the very first automotive brand to go to Dong Valley; that makes this journey even more special “

The short-film has been viewed over 2.06m views since its release, and the digital-first approach has also seen the Tiguan searched 3 times more than its key competitors.

According to ASN data, Volkswagen is still a niche auto brand in Asia: a mere 0.4% share of the category means that it doesn’t register in the top 10 spending brands in the region. It has invested almost US$10m across the region’s sponsorship market since Q416, with a consistent spend pattern over the past two years: its quarterly average spend continually hovers around the US$877k/quarter mark (by comparison, market leader Toyota spends over US$27.5m per quarter).

India continues to be the biggest market for the German carmaker, with over 80% of its total sponsorship investment allocated there. Before this content play, it had only invested US$125k in non-sporting platforms there (YTD 2019), with values depressed after two contract withdrawals (Sony TV’s Audience Music Awards and Zee TV’s Epicurean Guild Awards). That said, the brand typically invests in the last quarter of the year so there is still time for it to revert to its usual sponsorship levels and maintain brand saliency.