Volkswagen In the Buyer's radar
The challenge: Understand exactly what is the perception of the buyers of the Volkswagen brand to define our positioning territory and the best way to connect and attract our target in the Latin American Market.
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My role: Innovation Strategy Consultant. Field Research with customers, analysis & insights, workshops design and facilitation, presentations to the client.
For the Research we interviewed 58 people distributed between current clients of VW, ex clients and non clients of the brand to understand their perception of the brand, their experience in the search of a new car, and the after sales experience with the car they currently own. For this we used card sorting, a levels of importance map, and a brand ideal message format.
Interviews with car buyers.
Projective tools used during interviews
Sample distribution
The Synthesis socialized the findings of the research with the company in a way that showed the customer experience in 4 key dimensions: Communication, Sales, Product and Service. Each of these dimensions was analysed according to the customer’s perception of the brand vs. other brands and for each model studied so it was clear where VW was doing it right, where it was not well perceived and where the needed to improve the most compared with the competition.
4 dimensions of brand interaction
How the Communication, Sales, Product and Service moments of the buying a car process play a role in the overall experience with the brand, what is expected in each moment and how this changes according to the model of the car.
The ideation phase was designed to be done in co-creation sessions with customers where we covered aspects in Communication, Sales, Product Use, and Post-sales services in 5 different cities using different techniques for individual and group ideation. This sessions where recorded and compared in order to determine the final proposal for the client.
Ideation sessions with customers from VW and the competition in different product segments.
Validation. After the presentation of the field work findings to the management of the company, a high performance workshop was scheduled so key player from outside the company could validate such findings and the opportunities to help the brand improve sales without changing pricing strategies or opening more dealerships.
Validation workshop with key VW and dealership managers
Concept validation games
Idea and validation sheet
The Results of the ideas generated in the iterative process that proceeded this stage were illustrated in concepts with a brief description. This ‘art pieces’ were displayed as an exhibition in the main conference room of the VW offices in Colombia so each person invited to the final presentation could walk, observe and select their preferred pieces. Those with the most votes were the chosen ones to be implemented with higher level of priority.
VW Idea gallery
Illustrations of the concepts developed from the co-creation and evaluation of ideas.
Outcomes
The brand and their products are perceived as high quality, powerful engines, resistant, durable and superior in status than other brands that are direct competitors in their category.
On the other hand, is considered too expensive for poor interiors and lack of technology that the consumer can interact in a direct way such as touch screen, electric windows in all 4 doors, sunroof, controls in the steering wheel, among others.
The sales process of the dealers is not standardised and the experience varies considerably from dealership to dealership hurting the brand perception via voice.
The profile that appreciates the brand the most are commonly people with a technical or numerical background (engineers, economists, architects) that know about cars and understand specs that transparent to most.