Mazda Quality

Challenge

While Quebecers loved what Mazda stood for and often put the brand on their consideration list, interest wasn’t converting to sales. The issue: a perception that Mazda’s were prone to rust, stemming from a once-true but long-resolved manufacturing problem. Unfortunately, the rusty Mazda’s still on Quebec roads from the early 2000s were scaring potential buyers off. At the same time, dealers avoided “the rust talk” with buyers, worsening their lack of confidence in buying a Mazda.

To reverse Mazda’s fortunes in Quebec most efficiently, we’d need to focus on our biggest seller, the Mazda3, focusing on increasing three measures: consideration (the number of shoppers who put Mazda3 on their Top 5 list), intention (the number of shoppers who made Mazda3 their first choice), and sales. To succeed, we’d need to earn back car shoppers’ trust by proving corrosion was no longer an issue and inspire dealers to embrace “the rust talk” with them as an opportunity to clear up an outdated misperception.

Inspiration

Discovery interviews with Mazda’s Quality Assurance department revealed that Mazda was using localized winter conditions to test its vehicles, to prepare cars for the worst a given region had in store. They also revealed that Quebec had a compelling home-grown rust-prevention story we could leverage.

In Montreal, when the temperature drops below -15°C, the city’s road salting crews mixed gravel into their salt supply. While the gravel increased friction, it could also chip the paint off vehicles, exposing the metal underneath to the elements and leaving it prone to corrosion.

To combat this, Mazda studied wear patterns to understand where gravel chips were likely to occur and galvanized the sheet metal to ensure that even if exposed to the elements, it wouldn’t rust.

Idea

We set out to demonstrate the extreme lengths Mazda went to get the Mazda3 to withstand Montreal’s gravel-pelting winter conditions. We recreated Montreal’s uniquely harsh microclimate (well known to Quebecers) in a visually compelling lab setting. Before going live, we equipped Quebec dealers to confidently talk about the measures Mazda took to ensure its vehicles would not rust.

To this end, we made dealers a playbook, detailing how to respond to questions about quality and durability, and provided one-on-one training to help them get comfortable having, and even initiating, conversations about rust.

To Quebec car shoppers, we launched with a range of content that brought to life Montreal’s uniquely harsh winter conditions and told the story of how the Mazda3 had been adapted to thrive in them. We targeted moments on search, social, YouTube and Mazda.ca when we knew a Mazda was being actively considered, getting the right content in front of the right people when it would be most relevant and persuasive.

Growth

Our Quebec campaign exceeded all expectations, moving the brand from rust to trust in terms of how it was perceived.

Sales responded positively within just two weeks of launch and bucked the compact segment’s decline during the same period, which led to the rollout of additional localized testing stories, both in and outside Quebec.