The Challenge

Internally Auto Trader are a tech powerhouse, constantly innovating to redefine the car buying process. They represent both the dealers and buyers and realistically are the UK car market, but upstarts like Cinch (who unlike Auto Trader actually own their own cars), have entered the space to exploit a short-term gap. It’s eroding Auto Trader’s dominance, taking share of voice and could become a risk if they don’t earn back trust and create a platform in which to communicate their scale, knowledge and innovation.

The Insight

Life is full of twists and turns. Things change. As we move through various life stages our needs change and finding the right car is in the details. It’s no good having a family car that doesn’t fit the baby buggy, or enough seats to accommodate your children’s friends. It’s no good having an electric that can do 0-60 in 2.5 seconds if the range isn’t long enough to get you back to your parents in the midlands. With a range of cars thirty times bigger than their closest competitor, knowledge gained over a 48 year history, and a unique relationship with manufactures and dealers, no one knows details like AutoTrader. Following appointment, Recipe and Auto Trader kicked off the partnership the very next day. Everyone rolled up their sleeves to deliver the impossible - a brand spanking new TV campaign ‘Matchmaker Matchmaker’ in less than three months.

The Idea

Our strategic planning was airtight with creative ideas needing marginal development before handing over the reins to our award winning in-house production team who, with incredible agility turned around the creative in eight weeks, with the first spot airing on Boxing Day. Delivered across TV, Radio, Social, Digital, Web skin takeovers, Spotify, and broadcast partnership we wanted to not only create a unifying thought but also assets that would stretch and provide consistency across all media touch points. The incredibly sticky and joyous song “Matchmaker” from the musical Fiddler on the Roof did this and also created memorability through a completely new re-record of the commissioned music (a first of its kind), recorded live by an orchestra in Budapest. We also created a “rolodex” search bar in keeping with the famous search bar on the Auto Trader website that was easy to localise and target and sits across all static and motion assets.