Taobao lets Shanghai GM 'cheque out' wishlist data for a Regal launch

In the first-of-its-kind deal, Taobao is allowing SGM to mine its data resources for marketing. 'Cheque-out for your heart’s desires' is a digital campaign that aims to 'Drive your heart’s desire once more,' aligning the Buick Regal’s aspirational brand positioning with actual shopping habits. Hylink Digital Solutions heads the digital creative duties for the brand, while Lowe is the lead agency.

To target a broader and younger audience (up to 35 years old) for the vehicle's China introduction, Hylink launched the innovative cooperation with Taobao, China’s largest e-commerce platform. Taobao maintains a mammoth database with nearly 500 million registered users, of whom more than 60 million visit daily. The site handles about 48,000 purchases per minute and accounts for 80 per cent of China's online shopping.

Extracting data from this huge pool of users, SGM analysed shopping habits and searched through items users saved in their Taobao wishlist folders. The campaign engages logged-in consumers with personalised, tongue-in-cheek animations based on the lists, promising that Buick Regal may pay for, or 'cheque-out' the user’s wishlist items. SGM actually pays for a select number of user’s items to underscore the 'Heart’s Desire' theme.

When SGM buys winners' wish-list purchases, the event links back to the brand and to the offline world, inviting Taobao users to register for a Buick Regal test drive, which serves the ultimate objective of driving brand awareness, according to Jerry Liu, SGM's marketing spokesperson.

Within 12 hours of the weekend launch, the campaign generated 335,226 site views, 120,511 unique visits, 22,407 participations, and 1,928 successful test-drive leads. SGM plans to run the campaign for two weeks, ending on 25 October 2013.