1. Amity International Business School
Case Study
On
Strategies of Brand Awareness
By
Volkswagen India
Submitted to- Submitted by-
Ms. Meghna Sharma Naman Shrivastava
Faculty, ISM Kuhoo Chauhan
AIBS Asif Unia
Satyaneesh Dubey
Abhinav Chaudhary

2. Synopsis
Objective: How Volkswagen created brand awareness despite being a late entrant in Indian
automotive market.
Volkswagen (VW) is one of the world‟s leading automobile manufacturers and the largest
carmaker in Europe. As Volkswagen pursues its goal of becoming the number one automaker in
the world by 2018, India has become a key component of its strategy. India is currently the
world‟s second fastest growing car market, with shipments expected to more than double by
2018.
As a relatively recent entry into the Indian automotive market, VW needed to raise brand
awareness. When it started making cars in India on a large scale, most other Western car brands
had been in the country for over five years; and the Japanese car brands had been here for at least
ten. Indian, Japanese and Korean brands had built strong relationships with the middle of the
Indian market over the years.
To address this challenge, Volkswagen‟s marketing team focused one of its key brand pillars,
innovation, to make a strong impact throughout the roll-out in India. Innovation was showcased
not only in Volkswagen‟s product introductions, but also in its communications and advertising.
The present case study deals how Volkswagen came out with innovative marketing strategies to
establish its reputation and double its brand awareness.

3. Challenges for Volkswagen:
 By 2009, when it started making cars in India on a large scale, most other European car
brands had been in the country for over five years; and the Japanese car brands had been
here for at least ten.
 Europeans cars might be great there, but were they tough enough for Indian road
conditions?
 Question of money. In 2008, the total advertising investment in the car category was a
whopping 986 crore rupees. Getting even 10% of that would be too much for them.
 The challenge, therefore was to make a big bang on a small budget with a single story
that would weave together multiple facades of Volkswagen.
The Strategic approach to face the challenge:
 Doing One thing Well at a time-
Volkswagen would introduce the brand‟s values sequentially, one at a time.
 Innovation and Talk Value
The brand‟s primary objective was to get noticed and talked about. So which of the
brand‟s core values would make the most buzz – and inspire us in our buzz-making?
The Communication strategy:
To get the awareness levels Volkswagen needed to think big. So we innovated BIG. On 11th
November, 2009, we introduced India to Volkswagen with a major innovation. They bought
every ad in the Times of India.. every single one. It had never been done before, and it instantly
communicated the ambition and commitment Volkswagen had in India.

4. An innovative approach to segmentation-
The Beetle is undoubtedly one of the most unique automobiles created by Volkswagen. Thus it
was essential to launch the New Beetle in India in the most unique manner possible.
The New Beetle was launched as a fashion icon and not as just another car. The TVC created a
stir because instead of showcasing the car Volkswagen poked fun at fashion conscious women.
World’s first cut out newspaper
Volkswagen wanted to make sure that everyone knew that though Polo was a German car, it was
made in and for India. Therefore, they had to embed the car in the Indian media. They took the
idea literally.
Working with the Times of India, they became the first brand in the world to cut a hole in a
newspaper for marketing purposes. They punched a Polo-shaped hole in each copy of your
morning newspaper. Inside the “newspaper with a hole” you could read about each of the
innovative India-appropriate features of the Polo.

5. World’s first ‘handwritten’ newspaper
The Phaeton is exquisitely hand crafted model of Volkswagen. To bring this alive in an
attention-grabbing and innovative way, for one day only, each page of the paper was printed in a
different font, to make it look as if it had been written out by hand rather than printed by a
printing press.
World’s first “Talking Newspaper-
Volkswagen India created groundbreaking campaigns such as the world‟s first „talking
newspaper‟, which used light-sensitive chips to speak to readers about Volkswagen as they
turned the pages of their morning newspaper. The talking newspaper ad created a sensation in
India.
Mobile Advertising using AdMob-

6. Volkswagen used AdMob‟s reach and geo-targeting capabilities in order to focus this campaign.
With the objective of accessing a high net worth demographic and tech savvy audience, they ran
ads across AdMob‟s network focused on Blackberry and iPhone users.
AdMob‟s rich media and highly engaging ads enabled them to connect users directly to their
mobile site. Once on the site, they could learn more about the new Volkswagen Golf or even
download related content such as screensavers.
Result-
All three objectives were met by the combined campaign.
Awareness jumped exponentially and crossed the client‟s objective.
By June 2010, Volkswagen‟s reputation for being a brand that “makes innovative cars”
In the period from June 2009 to June 2010, they sold record breaking cars, with
substantial orders coming in for the higher priced Passat and Jetta models.

7. Bibliography-
1. www.google.com
2. www.volkswagen.co.in
3. Times of India online archives
4. Hindustan Times online archives