Following a successful first run in 2014, Nissan brought back their popular "Ride of Your Life" TV campaign for a second year, showcasing the Altima's performance and fun-to-drive features that make it "the most exciting sedan on the road." In this spot, Nissan gives unsuspecting mall goers a chance to "unlock" the Altima from a glass vault. Those lucky enough to be granted access were swept away for a surprise driving experience on the racetrack.
This time around, however, Nissan wanted to bring the thrill of "Ride of Your Life" to social media fans with an exciting campaign that would drive high volumes of engagement and online conversation for the Altima and "Ride of Your Life" program on Nissan-owned social media channels.
Nissan identified the target audience for the Altima as "confident individualists" – men and women in their early 30s who are driven, hardworking, and social and style conscious. The Altima is perfect for them because it has the performance to deliver a fun-to-drive experience and the dependability to put it to the test without hesitation.
Based on this demographic, Nissan found through additional secondary research that the target audience was very active in social media, and are at the center of their extensive social circles. They plan activities, convince their friends to try new things and live a lifestyle that people want to aspire to.
With their confidence, drive and savviness in social, Nissan realized that a social media program that put them to the test and demonstrated how they could handle any challenge thrown at them would resonate well.
Thus, Nissan created "The Altima Chase," an interactive social media scavenger hunt that kept the fun going even after the "Ride of Your Life" came to an end. The story centers on a fictitious Altima fan who was denied the opportunity to go on the "Ride of Your Life." The program kicks off with a video showing this "mastermind" plotting to steal the Altima so she can experience it for herself, eventually breaking though the Altima's glass vault and driving off. In the closing frame, she taunts Nissan's social fans with their mission: follow along and decode the clues to discover where she has hidden the Altima. By solving the clues, one fan would drive away with the ultimate getaway car, a 2015 Nissan Altima.
From there, fun and challenging clues were shared on Nissan's Facebook, Twitter and Instagram channels. From deciphering a phone number to call to hear a voicemail left by the mastermind with a hint for the next clue in the chase, to decoding a rebus puzzle, and on Instagram reposting an image with a filter to uncover a hidden message, each clue was uniquely crafted to put fans to the test.
Throughout the program, fans could visit a central hub for the story, clues and content. Here they could watch the original "Ride of Your Life" spot, follow the mastermind's latest travails and learn more about the Altima's features.
The Altima Chase concluded with one final riddle from The Mastermind: using three words and six possible combinations, fans had to determine the correct order and visit the website to uncover where she had taken the Altima. For those who were granted access, saw the Altima back on the Ride of Your Life racetrack.
The innovative ways in which social media fans were challenged to engage with Nissan and the Altima during the social scavenger hunt made the campaign stand out. Nissan knew that unique social challenges in each channel would get fans genuinely engaged and invested in the chase, anxiously awaiting the next clue.
In the end, this social scavenger hunt was a thrilling chase with equally exhilarating results. By using cutting edge, game-ified social content that allowed fans and potential Altima owners to test their skills, the Altima Chase was successful in driving social engagement and reach for the Altima on Nissan's social channels. It wasn't just a sweepstakes for fans, they invested time in helping find the Altima – and the results prove this.
The Altima Chase resulted in more than 113,000 social engagements, 12 million video views and 103 million social impressions. Not only did this program drive outstanding social engagement numbers, it also boosted conversation and sentiment for the Altima overall with a 14% increase in average daily mentions of the Altima in social conversation and a 5% increase in positivity for the vehicle during the campaign. In the end, based on the engagement this program drove, third-party analytics firm Unmetric called the program "one of the most popular campaigns in the auto industry in Q2 2015."
