Bobcat Advantage
A tried and true American company with a 50-year history needed a campaign worthy of introducing their most innovative product line in two decades. One that would demonstrate the line’s best-in-class strength to millions, bringing techs and specs to life in a way that would guarantee a return on their initial investment.
Service
UX design, Website design, Design system
Sector
Manufacturing
Year
2024
Problem to Be Solved
After 20 years of stagnant product development in the compact loaders and excavators space, Bobcat was launching a new product line. A line that represented great leaps in innovation not just for Bobcat but for the industry. They needed a cornerstone campaign that would command the attention the new M-series deserved. The challenge would be demonstrating the strength, precision and power of a one-ton piece of equipment without hosting millions of potentiwal customers at a construction site.
Project Goals and Challenges
Demonstrate how Bobcats latest excavator and loader line stood up to the competition
Integrate social, mobile, interactive, print and point of purchase for the first time in Bobcat marketing history
Leverage the unique strengths of HTML 5, jQuery and Flash to create a system that delivered both user experience and performance-testing gains
Develop and maintain a distinctive sub-brand across a range of agency partners
Manage a years-long campaign from media buy to tens of thousands of media placements
My Role
As the creative director at Bobcat’s video, interactive and print agency of record, I was tasked with defining the vision for the campaign and managing all the players necessary to bring it to life. This included designers, writers, developers and video editors on the AOR team as well as creatives across other partner agencies. This lift consisted of overseeing concept development, acting as on-set director, managing video post-production, defining the user experience, leading web development, planning the media buy and supervising asset creation. All while ensuring the campaign remained in bounds of both the budget and Bobcat brand.
The Process
Our campaign was inspired by the raw footage of machine tests that demonstrated the rugged capabilities of the M-series in a typical construction environment. We married textures native to these settings with a bare-bones aesthetic to establish the foundation of the Bobcat Advantage campaign. Our aim was to create an experience that felt like a reality car mechanic show mixed with Robot Wars. A new logo that represented the strength and power of the equipment was developed alongside other elements that could be used in video assets, ads, store displays, landing pages and more. Everything was documented in an expansive identity guide that would be used by every creative who touched what would become a multi-year campaign.The real work began with our team getting immersed in stat sheets and interviews with Bobcat experts to determine the most impactful way to put these new machines to the test against competitors. This was a critical step as we would be scripting and shooting head-to-head videos without knowing what the results would be. And, to work, they needed to show the Bobcat M-series as the clear winner. Fortunately, the machines performed and so did our team with an innovative, interactive website that allowed users to take an intuitive, self-directed tour. They were welcomed to the site by a video host who would subsequently guide them through the capabilities of each piece of equipment as it laid the competition bare. This site would become the cornerstone of the campaign with all marketing efforts from banner ads to billboards driving to it.
Results
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