It is no surprise that the sales of the luxury vehicle manufacturer Jaguar Land Rover Middle East and North Africa achieved an
all time sales record in March as MENA became its 3rd fastest growing region in the world and its 5th largest market. Afterall, the brand was presented the highly acclaimed Advertiser of the Year award at the Dubai Lynx International Festival of Creativity, in recognition of its advocacy for creative excellence in its brand communications and marketing efforts across multiple platforms.
We met Hannah Naji, Marketing Director, Jaguar Land Rover MENA, asking her how digital is being adapted as part of the marketing mix by the two brands.
What does digital advertising mean for JLR MENA?
“The adoption of digital across the region has been huge and had a profound impact as to how people both communicate and consume content. It’s now second nature to share and communicate through social channels, to consume media across multiple platforms, and expect highly relevant information and answers 24/7.
We see digital media as a way of listening to our audience, provide them with an opportunity to engage with us on their terms, and build a greater connection with our brand and drive loyalty. In addition, the internet has become an important research tool for automotive buyers and digital media is key in reaching out to these potential customers to inform and drive inquiries.”
When did JLR MENA start adopting digital as part of its marketing mix? Why?
“We started a number of years ago, but as infrastructure and penetration improved; digital has taken a more prominent role within the Jaguar Land Rover MENA business for a number of reasons. This first is to align with our audience habits, for them digital has become an integral part of their daily lives and we needed to ensure we aligned with that. In addition, the transparency and information provided by digital channels has helped drive efficiency across our audience communications
As a business, we cannot see digital as a standalone channel, at both a global and regional level Jaguar Land Rover MENA has worked hard to integrate digital media into our communications mix to continue the conversation as our audience switch between platforms and devices from the initial exposure to the brand to after purchase.”
What digital activities does JLR MENA adopt?
“We collaborate with a number of both local and international digital partners across desktop, mobile, and video based on our understanding of the platforms used by our audience both day to day and when researching new cars. This includes Google, Facebook, YouTube and Mobile properties. Depending on campaigns we expand the number of digital platforms used and look to always be at the forefront of testing new digital platforms.”
Which markets does JLR MENA focus on using digital advertising in? Why?
“Digital is a key platform across all of our Jaguar Land Rover MENA markets, however we look to localize our digital presence and communication by market to offer the most relevance. We do see more demand in the GCC due to very high mobile and internet usage in these markets.”
What’s the current approximate percentage that digital advertising takes out of JLR MENA’s total advertising spend? Will that change in the future? How so? Why?
“With the dynamic nature of the Digital media landscape here in MENA (and across the globe), we’re seeing consistent up weighs in Digital budget allocation year-on-year. Globally JLR allocates around 30% of budgets to digital and we look to emulate that locally.”
What digital “properties” does JLR MENA currently own?
“Jaguar and Land Rover both have dedicated MENA websites (HTML-5 and optimized for mobile), mobile apps, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, and Blog.”
What are, in your opinion, the innovative digital advertising that JLR MENA has done in 2013 / 2014? Why do you consider them innovative? What was the ROI achieved?
“Integration has become the key pillar in Jaguar Land Rover’s digital marketing strategies. Looking at the overall digital landscape it becomes evident that the MENA audience are highly active across many platforms and more importantly across multiple devices. Regional mobile penetration rates are amongst the highest in the world which presents us with a unique opportunity to drive brand appeal across multiple touchpoints.
Land Rover was the first brand in the MENA region to introduce the concept of ‘Shazammable’ TVCs. Users were 
able to ‘Shazam’ TV ads to consume additional content, and more importantly give users the opportunity to directly reach out to their relevant dealerships through the ad unit.
This in turn allowed Land Rover to firstly capture an audience with active interest in the vehicle, and to secondly provide them with a platform to convert interest into sales (call to the dealership).
Mobile marketing, as mentioned before, is a key regional touchpoint to reach local audiences on the go. With high mobile penetration rates, users are accessing and consuming brand messages from mobile devices throughout the day. For the Dubai International Motor Show 2013, Jaguar Land Rover took this opportunity to run a geo-fenced mobile campaign, driving users to the Jaguar Land Rover stands. Users within a mile radius of the trade center were targeted, as well as ‘social buzz monitoring’ to target people actively talking about relevant motor show related content across their social channels. This activity allowed Jaguar Land Rover to be present across the un-cluttered mobile sphere in an otherwise highly cluttered advertising space at the event itself.
Another key pillar for JLR Digital is quality content. Content integration allows brands to drive affinity and relevance within the local market. Land Rover teamed up with Brownbook to follow local Entrepreneur Yousuf Al Hashmi, as he took us through a day in his life as well as discussed his inspirations and his goals. Associating the Range Rover Evoque with a highly influential local personality generated brand engagement with the objective to drive strong local appeal.”
What’s next, digitally, for JLR MENA?
“Jaguar Land Rover MENA will continue to innovate, using digital media as the core driving force to create an impact and relevant user experiences with their exclusive product offering.”
