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November 2007 - Strategy Magazine
B!G Awards

Silver - Cundari

by Mary Dickie
page 71

Challenge

Charged with rebranding the venerable luxury automaker in Canada, the Cundari team changed just one word of BMW's tagline - from "The Ultimate Driving Machine" to "The Ultimate Driving Experience" - and saw the opportunities unfold to shift gears from a product focus to a richer experiential one. But before they could shift again, this time to The Ultimate Customer Experience, they had to bring BMW's employees into the loop. How to ensure that the BMW Associates - the ambassadors of the brand - were on board with the campaign's potential and purpose?

B!G Idea

Cundari designed a new internal culture for the company based on the motto We Power Joy and Excitement. First, a teaser email blast was distributed among employees to build interest around the new culture's launch at BMW's annual All Associates Meeting, as well as a video montage of classic movie clips featuring BMW cars and motorcycles. At the meeting, Cundari and BMW unveiled a photo mosaic spelling out the word "Joy," composed of hundreds of employee pics, plus their comments about working for the company. The image was posted on the BMW Group Canada's intranet site and given to all employees on a CD. When employees scan the image with a mouse, the individual thumbnails explode into a larger window that displays their picture and quote. This became the campaign's visual theme, and was included in all communications around the launch.

Impact

BMW has been able to leverage the initiative further with the creation of We Power Joy and Excitement thank-you cards, themed events and internal contests. As well, its success has led BMW to ask Cundari to create another internal cultural project for BMW Financial Services.

The judges have their say

Mike Welling

"What was wonderful about the BMW example was how actively an internal marketing campaign to quickly and dramatically influence employee behaviour from the top down was embraced. Not only was the intended business strategy communicated to employees, but it recognized that they too are consumers and have to buy in to the proposition, and it was done in a very creative fashion designed specifically for that purpose."

Ken Wong

"In the world of experience-based marketing, customer loyalty and employee loyalty must go hand in hand. Everyone says it, BMW found a way to do it (and to do it well)."

Patricia McQuillan

"The BMW internal branding campaign addresses a growing need in Canadian business - how to sustain employee engagement post-brand launch or repositioning."

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