Ideas for Good
Toyota had just gone through their biggest recall in history. The auto manufacturer was being portrayed negatively in all media outlets.
Brand perception and sales were abysmal. Toyota asked for a campaign which could help change the conversation; help remind people of their innovative engineering, quality products, and philanthropic endeavors.
My creative team created the program called "Ideas For Good." Ideas For Good was an initiative which invited consumers to re-purpose Toyota’s automotive technology to benefit society in the non-automotive space. A team of leading experts, including an editor of Wired and professor from Stanford, narrowed down the over 18,000 submissions to the top 25 ideas which had the most potential to help mankind. The general public then chose the top 5 winners from those top 25 finalists.
The 5 winners traveled to make their winning ideas a reality during a rapid-prototype weekend at Carnegie Mellon University. During that weekend, the winners partnered with engineers from Toyota, Deeplocal, and Carnegie Mellon to transform their ideas from sketches on paper, to functional, working prototypes.
The campaign, and prototype weekend was a success. This initiative gave Toyota their highest brand lift in almost a decade. Consumer perception changed, and Toyota is now the global sales leader in the automotive segment.
Toyota worked with Carnegie Mellon through a series of grants to help further develop these ideas. The Carnegie Mellon team traveled to Africa worked on turning the Solar Power Ventilation System into an actual, commercial product.
Not only is this work credited for being one of the most important initiatives Toyota implemented post-recall, it won awards at the International Advertising Competition (Outstanding Social Media Campaign, Outstanding Website, and Outstanding Integrated Ad Campaign), The Webby’s (Corporate Social Responsibility), and The Bees Awards (Best Reputation Management.)
It’s rare to have the opportunity to work on a project that can potentially save millions of lives. I loved this campaign and am extremely proud of the team, and all the work (see below) we produced.
Website
A website was created and served as the hub for the entire program. Entrants could upload their ideas, view other contestant's concepts, and learn more about the Toyota brand and its commitment to innovation and technology. The site was constantly evolving to reflect which stage of the contest we were currently in. The final phase required establishing a pathway from toyota.com to our micro site and Tumblr where we live-blogged during the prototype weekend. Post-prototype weekend, it served as the hub where we debuted the final video, shared insights of the winners and their ideas, posted photographs from the build-out, and established the link between Toyota and Carnegie Mellon University for project update
TV
How to Play Page
Web Videos
We planned a digital push for Phase II of the contest by airing two short films online. Wanting to demonstrate Toyota’s cutting-edge technology, and show a tease of what the rapid-prototype weekend will be like, we built-out two of the ideas we introduced in our broadcast spots. Creative-engineering firm, Deeplocal, helped bring our “Medical Relief Tent” and “Roller Coaster” ideas to life as a proof of concept. We promoted these two documentary films through relevant, influential bloggers and Toyota’s social channels.
