Mercedes-Benz: 4MATIC Adaptive Book

Credits & Description:

Category: Automotive
Media: Digital
Brand: Mercedes
Agency: Gruppo Roncaglia
Geo: Italy
Advertising Agency: Gruppo Roncaglia, Italy
Creative Director: Carla Leveratto
Creative Supervisor / Art Director: Marco Fresta
Senior Copywriter: Bruno Puntura
Client Service Director: Lorenzo Lorato
Account Supervisor: Federico Lombardi
Senior Account Manager: Tia Portelli
Social Media / Community Manager: Valeria Cinelli
Senior Digital Developer: Simone Tricarico
Production: Psycle
Director: Alex Fry
Senior Project Manager: Scott Mathers
Creative Director: Haris Amiel
Ideation Director: Mark Gristock
Design / Motion: Albert Sanjuan, Alejandro Castellanos, Ana Costa
Technical Lead: Mike Parsons
Interface Developers: Rich Dooley, Leah Thompson
Editor: Visual Editions
Creative / Editorial Direction: Anna Gerber, Britt Iversen
Published: June 2017
Short Synopsis:
4MATIC is the most advance all-wheel drive system, adapting the car to a person's context whatever it might be. Mercedes needed to communicate such technology in a way that felt personal and relevant, reflecting the current conditions of everyone we reached. So we partnered with Google and, after months of coding, Gruppo Roncaglia, Rome created the 4Matic Adaptive Story. The first story that automatically adapts the narrative and visual elements to the reader's context, just like 4MATIC does.

Extended Synopsis:
The Campaign
The creative idea was to create 4MATIC Book: the first adaptive
story, able to change according to reader context, just like the
4MATIC tech. The storytelling, with a specific focus on reading, was
used as a creative tool to precisely reach the target. Everyone reads the story in a unique way and in a personal context. The same context where we reach our target.
Creative Execution
With Google partnership, we developed the first story able to adapt to reader’s context, just like 4MATIC tech, which adapts to roads and weather changes. Using Google APIs and mobile devices features we created the first example of adaptive storytelling, generating a new story each time a new starting position is registered. A tale that changes according to infinite variants, which include weather, city traffic, time of the day, but also the user last activity on his web browser: websites or YouTube videos from which he landed on our story. A travel story written by one of the most known Italian writer: Gianrico Carofiglio, transformed into an adaptive story and made
unique by the users, reading after reading, just like the writer himself once said: stories are not owned by the one who writes, but by the readers themselves. The activity allowed the brand to engage the target talking to each single user, with a product thought around each one of them. Read the 4MATIC book: https://www.theshapeofclouds.e...
Just within the first weeks of the activity over 9
000 unique stories were created, and around the same number of readers. Lead generation was 5x higher than previous similar campaigns, also thanks to direct links to more “business oriented” activation within the story. Over 1.3 Million views on the video spot on YouTube, over 40 articles between online and offline magazines and 56 Million Media Impressions. Besides, the project changed the way eBooks are experienced, and moved the interest of many editors, like Editions at Play, which chose to insert the book in its own online catalogue.
Mercedes-Benz is a pioneer of 4WD tech: 4MATIC has a history of success and, through time, evolved to adapt on every road. Our insight: a story that adapts to your journey Target: 30 to 60yo, with middle to high culture and high purchasing power, which uses mobile devices as a reading tool. Mobile it’s then crucial as it’s the primary device where the story is read, and it provides users geolocalization and other details, allowing the story to change according to these data. The most important digital assets were involved: YouTube ads, geolocalized banners, Google Adwords and Social media. A dedicated product-focused landing (geolocalized) allowed the users to fully discover 4MATIC tech, starting from their own home town.