• Autoglass® wants to boost sales in a declining market
• It tests TV advertising to ensure the most efficient schedule and operational structure
• In just 12 months, the business has been refashioned around TV

The challenge

Autoglass® has been a successful radio advertiser for years. Its challenge in 2008 was to find other higher reach media to grow its business in a declining market.

Car crime was falling and mileage was dropping as high fuel prices drove people off the roads meaning that fewer consumers were suffering glass damage.

Analysis of the market showed that one thing was stopping motorists calling Autoglass® - apathy. Seventy percent thought that a chip or scratch is not significant enough damage for repair.

However, with 16% of motorists currently driving around with windscreen damage at any one time there was a huge opportunity to activate consumers.

The TV solution

Integrating TV into the mix presented a host of business challenges. Autoglass® would need to be staffed up to handle extra business, as it takes up to 12 months to train a technician.

Call centre volumes needed to be managed, as did the link between the workforce and databases run by the major insurance companies who often pick up the bill for these repairs.

Analysis of car owner behaviour revealed that while 11% would do nothing and 69% thought they didn’t need to do anything, 2.63m would act to repair any problem.

The “do somethings” tended to be younger, drive higher mileage cars and have families. TV would educate them as to why they needed to do something, make sure it was relevant and make Autoglass® accessible to this audience.

The ad showed how a small chip could become a crack and potentially worse just through normal everyday driving, before demonstrating how easy it was for Autoglass® to repair the damage.
Airtime was rolled out on a regional basis to control costs and ensure the operational aspects of the business could manage the demand generated. Radio and TV were tested together and separately to measure the impact of each.

The sonic trigger of “Autoglass® repair, Autoglass® replace” used on radio was adopted, as were learnings on frequency.

Fifty-second and 20-second ads ran in both peak-time to hit parents in the evening after the children had gone to bed and during the daytime to hit school-run mums.

Autoglass® ran four distinct bursts using regional terrestrial TV, with activity in different regions to test both the effectiveness and profitability of different DRTV strategies.

They tested the use of radio alongside TV, the operational challenges of using weekend advertising as well as weekday messages, the power of daytime versus the cost of peak together with a more mixed schedule.

Results

The success of TV has lead Autoglass® to refashion its business in just 12 months. It has benefited from significant sales improvements while also maintaining customer satisfaction at record levels.

Call centres have been integrated into the TV activity and provided with the schedule so that staff breaks can be avoided during the five minutes after a spot airing.

Staff holidays and technician incentives have been introduced to ensure maximum staffing when TV advertising is running.

Finally, Autoglass® has recruited more than 200 mobile repair specialists –who require a shorter two-week training programme – to provide the business with the tools to respond to its marketing success.

Website traffic has risen alongside the TV activity with lots of online completions in the evenings when the ads are on air.

The parent company of Autoglass® has now rolled out increased TV investment in France, Belgium, Canada and Holland. Another three markets will also invest in TV as a result of the UK’s success.