This eBusiness Marketing and Content Leader gives iMedia a glimpse into the extensive work and thought that goes into each product launch.

More than just an automobile, Volkswagen is a way of life. It is a brand that speaks to all generations and whose consumers are tech savvy. With approximately 80% of VW consumers going online to shop and research before purchasing, Todd Riley’s position of eBusiness Marketing and Content Leader is essential. In his role, Riley is responsible for everything that goes on at VW.com and all other partnerships established with other dot-coms. He has been with the company almost three years, and he recently took the time to speak to iMedia about where the company is heading and how it perceives online advertising.

iMedia Connection: Has Volkswagen executed any online campaigns recently? If so, what did it involve and what made it successful?

Riley: We’re constantly doing campaigns at this point, and that’s hopefully growing. Essentially, the biggest reason for [these campaigns’ success] is that we’ve been integrating from step one. We’ve been trying, at the very earliest planning stages, to coordinate and integrate so that we understand from a big picture what we’re doing and how we can build that campaign to leverage every last opportunity there is.

For example, with our Touareg campaign launched recently, in the initial planning stages when we were determining what the budget should be on an overall level, we were working from a strategic and creative standpoint with Arnold, our agency. Often online and creative sync up very close with print and outdoor executions.

We allow and request that our media partners are involved in an early stage. For the Touareg, we had a media day where we invited 30 different partners. First of all, we gave them an idea of what we’re looking for, but more than just giving them a request, we actually gave them a download of what the product is all about and really got them on the inside. The idea was to give them as much information as we can and then give them some very specific objectives for directional purposes and let them go back and come up with plans.

From that standpoint, it’s about working closely with our partners and really educating them on what our vision is for the product launch, in this case the Touareg, our new SUV and then letting them come back with integrated ideas throughout their sites that could really go beyond the banners and the promotions. Promotionally, we don’t do too much with sweepstakes; it’s more about getting involved with the product itself. We have a sponsorship with PBS and the Blues. We also have the Touareg road tour with numerous blues concerts. We’re creating a section of the site where we work to promote those different segments of the tour with a map and really make it integrated and something that people can relate to, something they can get involved in, something they can follow.

iMedia Connection: So it sounds as though one of the greatest lessons you learned was to get everyone involved in the beginning stages.

Riley: Yes, I think that’s a great thing for us. By getting people involved early, especially with the creative, it brings a whole new tone to the online aspect and is not an afterthought any more. What tended to happen in the past is everything would get done offline and then online was an add-on. We currently have a print campaign where the strategy behind this campaign was to get people to understand different products that we have. If you look at the print campaign, there are actually navigation cues from the online aspect. So the magazine spread actually has the navigation highlight at the top of it. When the magazine or the print ad design is built off of what the site looks like, that’s telling me right away that we’re truly working in an integrated nature. It’s really getting everyone involved at the very beginning so that the good ideas bubble up, and sometimes the online space drives the other creative or other media choices.

iMedia Connection: Has there been any corporate reluctance at Volkswagen in using the Internet to advertise?

Riley: It’s not reluctance. It’s more a lack of understanding of what the true value is. Corporate America sometimes links the stock market and dot-com bust and what happened with that to the dot-com opportunities for marketing. When a lot of people started hearing about the dot-com crash they started thinking that everything was going to quiet way down. The reality of it was the strong, corner stone type sites kept moving. There was never a question of whether we’d want to keep working with them or integrating with them. But I think from a corporate management standpoint, they kind of focused on the failure of the whole dot-com crash and generalized their opinions towards that.

The reality is, consumers are [still] going online. We know that about 80% of our customers go online and shop one way or another and research their product before purchasing it, and that number is increasing everyday. As we better educate our corporate management, we have more and more of their support. It’s very difficult to get the buy in from a corporate level if there’s not a true understanding and grasp of what it all means. We keep trying to point out how important it is to our customers to have us there and then how important it is to integrate the overall experience. It always comes down to how much it will cost to actually do that. It’s always that value/benefit ratio that we’re struggling with. But it’s an educational process, and we keep pushing forward. [As] our corporate managers better understand the benefits, they’ve been very supportive of everything we’re trying to accomplish.

iMedia Connection: What does your company have planned for the future in order to approach the interactive space in different and unique ways?

Riley: There was always a separation between leads and online advertising in the automotive area. The reality is that a lead, whether it’s as simple of a lead as a name and a phone number or it’s a lead that gets someone to click through and enter information on our site, it’s still a form of advertising and communication. Dollars allocated from a media standpoint to online advertising can certainly be used as well for lead generation and even the purchase of leads. If you have an Edmunds.com that’s out there getting the information from customers, and you use your advertising dollars to get that information, that’s essentially creating the same result as a banner ad. It’s just coming with more rich detail. We’ve been working a lot with our agencies to say: “Don’t think of it as just buttons or banners but deeper relationships” so that when that person clicks over, we have much more information we can attach to them and get them one step closer to going for a test drive or purchasing. That’s the one thing we’re looking at: Media dollars can be used towards leads as well.

iMedia Connection: How do you perceive rich media? Have you used it in campaigns?

Riley: Rich media is great. We actually use it a lot. We’re going to start generating more data collection in media itself, in a banner ad itself with a roll over or something. We’re actually implementing data capture right in the creative so we can create a lead without them coming to vw.com. We do use rich media a lot. We have an aspirational brand, and people really enjoy hearing what we have to say from a marketing standpoint. We try to keep it fun. We have people come to our site everyday to watch our commercials over and over again. So if anyone is seeking out our brand to that extent, we know that they can also enjoy the experience of rich media.

When we’re using it, I think it’s really important that we have frequency caps. It’s not just frequency caps for our rich-media application but it’s for that session. We want there to be only one rich-media application during that session. And the reason for that is if I’m the fifth rich-media experience that comes up during someone’s visit to an individual site, they might really like my application but because it’s the fifth one and they may have disliked the four before, that’s really starting to intrude on their privacy and their experience. We don’t want to be attached to that at all.

iMedia Connection: So you think that the benefits make up for the cost?

Riley: The benefits definitely outweigh the cost when it’s used properly. We used it with Eurovan awhile back, which is one of our less emotional products, but rich media did a great job at showing demonstrations of the versatility of the product features. The New Beetle convertible launch and Touareg launch also used a lot of rich media.

iMedia Connection: How do you evaluate different sites for media placement?

Riley: We look at a lot of different things. We don’t work off demographics as much as a lot of other companies. We create driver profiles. These are more based off of psychographics because our thought is that owning a Volkswagen or wanting one is really something that can span generations; it’s more a state of mind than a state of need. It could be a 55-year-old who had a Beetle as his first car, and now he has a Mercedes. But he would also like to have a New Beetle because it reminds him of his younger, more carefree days. Or you could have a 22-year-old who thinks the New Beetle is the coolest thing around, which proves the generational thing isn’t as important to us as it is a mindset.

So basically because we look at “drivers’” profiles and psychographics, we have to find sites that really match up well in those areas. We basically break it down between three key areas. One would be more of that psychographic profile to make sure it matches up with our automotive brand. We also look at portals for sheer numbers. The last is what we consider to be in market sites. So if we have information that’s very purchase-focused such as an incentive or driving people to our buying tools, that would be done in a market site. This could include; the automotive section of The Washington Post or Edmunds.com or other sites like that.

iMedia Connection: Is there any knowledge you can impart to traditional advertisers that may be hesitant to enter into the online space?

Riley: Online gives us so many more targeting opportunities, and if the creative is done right, you can brand just as well as you can anywhere else. And not only can you brand or target, but you have an instant ability to extend the experience through a link to your site where a consumer can experience the product inside and out on what the brand stands for, and it’s his or her choice right then and there. A TV commercial is over after 30 seconds, and at the end of that impression, even if the customer wants more, there’s nothing more that he or she can do except maybe come to the Website. With online advertising, it’s a direct connection for the consumer. If you as a marketer feel that you have a compelling message that can make an impact on someone to make him or her want to take the next step, which is what all advertising is supposed to do, then this is the one medium that has a direct connection to the ultimate purchase.