Kwik Fit’s marketing philosophy runs across three pillars: reach, relevance, and reassurance. The UK-based car servicing and repair company partnered with Waze to develop a three-pronged approach ensuring that the company not only had a wide reach, but also that its message — synchronized with other marketing messages — reached the customer just at the moment when it was likely to have the greatest relevance.
Rethinking the customer-brand relationship
Through its marketing studies, Kwik Fit and Mediacom found that even though folks had often heard of Kwik Fit, there was an opportunity to further increase unprompted awareness. The team wanted Kwik Fit to be top of mind whenever a customer might need its services. “Essentially, people recognize the brand when they see the advert, but they don’t consider it necessarily when they need car servicing,” says Chris Smith, Associate Director at Mediacom in London. “We saw the lack of consideration as a pretty big opportunity to build a brand nationally.” Instead of interacting with consumers on simply a transactional level, the team needed to find a way to transform the relationships into one rooted in confidence and trust.
Synchronizing messaging for greater relevance
Working alongside Waze, Mediacom put together a multichannel approach on behalf of Kwik Fit. First, it secured an advertising slot in the Global Traffic Network (GTN), the travel and traffic news in the UK that’s served across all radio stations, regardless of station owner. In conjunction with this spot, the team built creative for Waze. Because times for GTN news and ad spots are known well in advance, Kwik Fit could ensure that the brand messaging on Waze appeared for the driver within a 30-minute timeframe of the radio ad.
The team also ran advertisements on roadside billboards with a digital twist. When a Waze user drove by one of these billboards, Waze displayed a Zero-Speed Takeover ad for Kwik Fit. This advertisement had an engaging, clickable format and notified the driver that they could take advantage of a free vehicle safety check today.
The results are really, really strong. We'd been expecting a lift in engagement, but to have a 4x lift in engagement is incredible.
Chris Smith, Associate Director, Mediacom
Syncing media lifts engagement 4x
Through their partnership with Waze, Kwik Fit not only harnessed the reach and relevance it had been looking for, but also achieved a 4x increase in ad engagement when compared to benchmark metrics. It became the first in the market to align Waze advertising with radio and out-of-home marketing — a coordination that connected the Kwik Fit brand with the customer at the key times when the customer is more likely to be receptive.
“To have a 4x lift in engagement is incredible,” says Chris. “We’re really, really happy with that.”
