Creative Brand Cross-Promotion - Toyota iQ and Google Street View

June 5, 2012

Google Street View is a handy tool that lets you explore places around the world through 360-degree street-level imagery. But when Google Street View debuted in Belgium last year, there was a problem. Many streets in Belgium are too small for a car to navigate. Therefore, Google Street View had gaping holes of missing content in Belgium. Google needed to fill those gaps.

Toyota iQ is a tiny car as you can see in the above image. The Happiness Brussels agency saw an opportunity to promote the Toyota iQ while solving Google’s problem at the same time. Toyota iQs were fitted with 360-degree cameras and equipment to record the narrow streets that Google’s cars couldn’t.

A special iQ Street View website launched where consumers were asked to add streets that hadn’t been captured by Google Street View yet, and the Toyota iQ would go out and capture them. People could also view tagged streets on the iQ Street View site and sign up to test drive the Toyota iQ. The site also includes a video that shows the Google Street View and Toyota iQ story. You can watch it below.

But that’s not all. People who live on the narrow streets tagged on the iQ Street View website will be mailed special offers for the Toyota iQ. There is no doubt that the people who live on those streets are a perfectly targeted audience for the iQ.

This is a great example of out-of-the-box creative thinking that brings two strong brands together for a cross-promotional opportunity that benefits both of the participating brands and consumers. What do you think? Leave a comment and share your thoughts on the Google Street View and Toyota iQ cross-promotion initiative.

Image: Toyota

Bio
Latest Posts

Susan Gunelius

President & CEO at KeySplash Creative, Inc.

Susan Gunelius is the author of multiple marketing, social media, branding, copywriting, and blogging books, and she is President & CEO of KeySplash Creative, Inc., a marketing communications company. She also owns Women on Business, a leading blog for business women. She is a featured columnist for Entrepreneur.com, a featured writer for Forbes.com, and the Guide to Blogging for About.com. Additionally, her marketing-related articles have appeared on websites such as MSNBC.com, FoxBusiness.com, WashingtonPost.com, TheStreet.com, SmartMoney.com, TodayShow.com, BusinessWeek.com, Yahoo! Finance, Yahoo! Small Business, and more. She has nearly 20 years of experience in the marketing field having spent the first decade of her career directing marketing programs for some of the largest companies in the world, including divisions of AT&T and HSBC. Susan also appears at in-person and virtual events where she speaks about marketing, branding, social media, and more (visit www.SusanGunelius.com for more information). You can connect with her on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn.