Ford meets Fear Factor – Marketing Magazine, June 21, 2004

Late last year, Ford Motor Company of Canada took a bold new step in the way it markets cars and trucks. At that time, Ford aired Canada's first long-format "reality infomercial" for its new F-150 pickup - a highly anticipated new product in the automotive segment and Ford's number-one -selling vehicle in Canada.

Why do an infomercial for a pickup truck? According to Dean Tesser, director, marketing communications, the reasons are found in the product itself. "We had two highly anticipated product launches for the 2004 model year: the new F-Series pickup and the next generation of Ford minivans, the new Freestar. Both of these products involved radical changes to existing vehicle lines; changes so significant that it was impossible to get all that information into a standard 30-second television commercial."

But Ford didn't want just any infomercial. It wanted something new and bold. "We wanted something as innovative as the products themselves," says Tesser. "We had aggressive plans for these new products. So we wanted aggressive creative that would help deliver the numbers to make this long-format venture worthwhile."

Enter Stonehenge Media Group, a full-service Toronto-based production company. We worked with Wunderman (a division of Y&R Canada), Ford's direct marketing agency, to develop ideas that stretched the current boundaries of the infomercial genre. We had done some testimonial-based TV commercials for Ford in the past that worked well, and it was the originality of those spots that won us this project.

Breaking new ground in TV commercials is difficult enough. Achieving the same objective in the world of infomercials, a genre where the tried-and-true formula is the norm, would be even harder. Our director, James Musselman, worked alongside Wunderman's creative team to find the right approach that would make these infomercials stand out.

"The more I looked at the project, the more I could see it was begging for a reality-show based concept," remembers Musselman. "It was a natural. The reality TV phenomenon was growing stronger. So why not capitalize on its current popularity?"

Musselman and our production team began the development of what would become a new genre: the reality infomercial. The first lesson we adopted from reality TV involved the use of challenges to engage the audience. "People love to see the participants in these shows challenged to perform some kind of task," says Musselman. "Weird, wild, crazy challenges are what make them interesting to the audience."

We adopted the Fear Factor model for the F-150 infomercial. "It made sense given the nature of the product," says Musselman. "You expect a truck to work hard, be tough and rise to the occasion when challenged to perform."

For the Freestar infomercial, we used the popular reality show Queer Eye For The Straight Guy as the format model. "It was a totally different audience," recalls Musselman. "And a totally different vehicle. You wouldn't expect a minivan to do the same things a pickup would do. Besides, Queer Eye is very popular with women, and so are minivans."

We quickly realized the one big difference between doing reality TV and doing a reality-based infomercial. According to Brian Langerfield, creative director at Wunderman: "The product is the central character in an infomercial, no matter what the genre. Challenges are great, but they must challenge the vehicle first and then the participants."

With that in mind, we scouted locations where the new Ford F-150 could be put to the test. We ended up shooting at three different sites that offered the potential for extreme challenges and much-needed visual appeal: a gravel pit, an airfield and a racetrack.

For the Freestar, Musselman wanted to see the minivan performing in a critical situation. "I wanted to put it in a situation where the stress level was very high; where it could help relieve that stress," he says. "And what could be more stressful than a wedding day?" But try finding a real family planning a real wedding and willing to participate in an infomercial shoot. Our team worked the phones feverishly for weeks before finding the perfect family.

We also added a few twists to the reality-TV formats we were emulating. We added an automotive expert to the F-150 commercial to discuss the technical aspects. For the Freestar, we included a surprise challenge that was not part of the original wedding plans. We hired a string trio to play at the reception as a special gift to the wedding couple, but with a catch. The family had to use the Freestar to pick up the musicians and their instruments and deliver them to the reception hall. This little wrinkle helped show how spacious and flexible the Freestar is.

Both infomercials were part of an integrated communication program that involved broadcast, print and an Internet component. The payoff for the infomercials' audience was a unique information package that went far beyond what they could pick up by walking into a dealership. Included in that package was a certificate for a special premium incentive that could only be acquired when the customer came in for a test drive. The results have been better than expected. "Our test drive target for our handraisers was 20% - a very aggressive goal. In fact, the test drive response rate ended up dramatically superseding those expectations. Not only is it the highest test drive response rate we have ever seen, it was achieved during the winter months," says Kelly Barrett, account director at Wunderman.

What made these infomercials so successful? According to Musselman, "They were good, entertaining TV first and good infomercials second. Audiences felt like they were watching a real program, not a drawn-out commercial. That got them hooked and kept them hooked for the whole 30 minutes."

Lynda Rinkenbach is a partner with Stonehenge Media Group in Toronto.