Problem Playground

Within the auto sector, Toyota owned "hybrid" through years of investment behind Prius. Honda had to fight back. However, Honda’s business went beyond simply making a hybrid car. They have shown a passion for wide-ranging environmental innovation for over 40 years. Honda needed to deliver great ROI, build audience understanding of Honda’s environmental heritage and range of problem solving activity.

The Passion Programme is a series of research studies dedicated to understanding subjects that inspire passion, the first looking at the growing ethical and green consumer movement. The three-part study comprised of: a quantitative survey of 1,000 nationally representative UK adults, a series of focus groups and a moderated online discussion forum where respondents gave their opinions on different brand’s green or ethical communication.

Four groups were identified at different stages of the green adoption curve and the two most active groups (the key Honda targets) were the Passionates and Dutifuls. Passionates are highly motivated – the only group who regularly campaign, blog and boycott. Dutifuls are enthusiastic without being political, they view going greener and more ethical as the only sensible course of action to take. Although differing demographically, the research uncovered key times when green and ethical receptivity is heightened for Passionates and Dutifuls, for example on bin day, when commuting and often when at work.

The research found that green messages can be particularly resonant during these times, making them want to take action. In these moments of receptivity, Honda provided opportunities for the audience to get involved and, like Honda, take action by solving problems in a puzzle-based communications strategy in commuter media.

Honda’s association with problem solving was further enhanced via online sponsorship the environment section of Yahoo! Answers, and the directions page of Multimap (creating a new sponsorship position in the process). At the same time, our audience contributed to the completion of a 20,000 piece virtual jigsaw puzzle, which ‘created’ the Problem Playground website, hosting a range of environmental puzzles, games and Honda stories.

The campaign was 16 points ahead of a challenging client target. Some 140,000 unique visitors spent a total of 5,500 hours at problemplayground.com, with an average of 8 page views per visit – clearly demonstrating the audience’s enthusiasm to find out more about Honda’s heritage and range of environmental problem-solving activity.