The Out-of-Home media genre has been shaken up recently with the appearance on the local scene of the brand new AdsOnCars program from local company, Car Advertisements (M) Sdn Bhd, based in Damansara Utama.

AdsOnCars takes a new look at an older form of vehicle-based advertising, through partnering with motorists who are keen to earn extra income, paid to them monthly, for carrying company ads on their cars – a creative departure from advertising on commercial vehicles!

This type of program has been running in US, UK, Europe, Canada and Australia for several years, and has proven to be not only extremely popular with drivers, but also with corporate advertisers.

This media allows penetration into the social fabric of a community like no other medium. People are social animals and everyone interacts with different sets of people daily such as work colleagues, friends, relatives and various other social circles. The wrap invariably becomes a talking point and evolves into a powerful selling tool, taking on a life of its own wherever it is seen. Viral Marketing in action? Probably and at no extra cost.

Cost wise, AdsOnCars outstrips its rivals cantering in at a low CPM as well as stretching your advertising dollar to new circular parameters. This is a new dimension in getting value for money in these hard times. For example, a full page ad in most English national dailies will cost you some RM30,000 for just one day’s exposure. By comparison, that same RM30K, spent with the AdsOnCars team, will get you one month’s worth of exposure, sing some 35 cars, each of which will do at least 1,000km in those 30 or 31 days.

Research has shown, wrapped vehicles in fairly heavily populated urban locations get in excess of 30,000 views per day. With 35 cars, that’s more than 1,000,000 views per day, easily out stripping the daily views expected from any top selling tabloid. And, you get that for every day of the month, not merely one day!

AdsOnCars takes a complete project management approach and looks after every aspect of the program, from driver selection and payment of the fees to the driver, to providing creatives (if required), and wrapping the cars in high quality, two ply vinyl. Naturally, reports are provided to the advertisers, designed and tailored to their requirements.

The cars are “audited� by the AdsOnCars team every month, prior to payment of the monthly fees, to ensure the wrap’s condition remains as good as when applied, and that the drivers’ commitment to a minimum monthly mileage is being met.

It’s been a fairly natural transition from the lower quality bus and taxi wraps, to significantly higher quality car wraps. Not only is the vinyl material of far higher standard, durability and visibility, than the stickers used on the taxis or buses but private cars don’t carry any of the negative baggage associated with these forms of public transport.

One of the earliest to take advantage of this new media was HSBC’s Islamic Finance arm, HSBC Amanah, who used a number of highly visible wrapped cars, to publicise the opening of of their new branches. “We felt that location-based marketing would create the strongest impact of brand visibility and [strengthen] the presence of a HSBC Amanah branch nearby,� says Head of Marketing, Abdul Sani Abdul Murad.

Other than static billboards, HSBC Amanah wanted a more interactive experience with consumers, especially business people operating around the areas. The plan was to capture the imagination of the business owners with their tagline “Is your bank doing enough for your business?� and provide them with instant access to their services through contact information displayed on the body of the car – hotline number, website. On lookers can even approach the driver of the vehicle for more information!�

As the drivers of the vehicles were to be equipped to handle customer enquiries, HSBC Amanah felt it would only be natural to leverage on their mobile bankers who are already ambassadors for the Commercial Banking arm of HSBC Amanah. “Our mobile bankers are required to actively travel to meet customers/potential customers around the branches and in nearby high traffic areas to raise the awareness of the HSBC Amanah brand, and to prompt business owners to stop our mobile banker, to find out how we could improve on their current banking status,� explains Abdul Sani.

He adds regarding the choice of driver, “It was a conscious choice to get our staff to participate in this medium, as we wanted to avoid drivers with a negative image and people who were not familiar with the advantages of business banking with HSBC Amanah eventually giving the wrong impression of the brand.�

At present HSBC wrapped cars are mostly around areas nearby HSBC Amanah branches, which are Ampang, Shah Alam and Juru, as well as the nearby business centres and are targeted at residents, specifically business owners in the area.

Though it is too early to calculate, in numbers, the ROI of this campaign which rolled out in the first week of July this year, but HSBC Amanah is pleased and confident to say their cars have turned a lot of heads with its eye catching design!