AD BATTLE #3: Renault Clio vs Fiat 500: Whose ad “electrified” the audience?
In their recent ad campaigns, both Renault and Fiat have decided to promote the electric/hybrid-powered generation of their iconic models Renault Clio and Fiat 500. Both ads take the idea of “continuation” as a starting point, but we see two totally different finalizations. If you are not (yet) familiar with the concept and format of “Ad Battle”, click here for our beginner pack.
Renault takes us through a stirring journey of a mother and her son while drawing brilliant parallels between her son growing up and Renault Clio’s evolution over the years, whereas Fiat takes on Leonardo DiCaprio, the movie star and climate activist, to offer endorsement for Fiat’s mission.
Renault Clio The next chapter of a great story, YouTube, uploaded by Renault France
Fiat 500 Reincarnation, YouTube, uploaded by Fiat
Sentimental narrative or celebrity endorsement? Which strategy will prove to be more effective? Will female and male audience react differently? Keep reading and find out the answers!
If you only have two minutes, here’s our takeaway version for you:
Renault’s narrative strategy resonates very well with female viewers, whereas Fiat 500, thanks to Leonardo DiCaprio, addresses both female and male viewers with no significant difference.
In the production of Renault, the scenes of mother-son interaction generate significant positive emotions within (female) viewers. In the Fiat 500 ad, viewers’ positive reactions coincide with the appearance of Leonardo on the screen.
Viewers remain constantly engaged throughout the Renault Clio ad. In Fiat 500, we observe a slight drop of attention as from 00:00:19 till the end, this coincides with the ending of DiCaprio’s close-up shot and the entering of packshots (name, logo and tagline).
Therefore, we announce a tie for Ad Battle #3 Renault Clio vs. Fiat 500!
If you want to find out how to learn from their success and lessons to improve you own video content, keep reading! Detailed analysis and tips from FEELIN to discover below
Round One: Emotional Impact
Renault Clio The next chapter of a great story: 12.24% of Feelers reacted with strong emotions, the dominant emotion is happiness (8.2%).
Fiat 500 Reincarnation: 18.75% of Feelers reacted with strong emotions, the dominant emotion here is also happiness (12.5%).
Happiness elicitation sequences Renault
Happiness elicitation sequences Fiat
In The next chapter of a great story, we see a significant discrepancy between female and male viewers’ reactions (we’ll talk about that later). Female viewers show strong positive emotions during multiple scenes emphasizing how the mother raises her son with love and care.
In Reincarnation, both female and male viewers react with strong positive emotions. Perhaps female is also more impressed than male by the close-up shot of Leonardo (here he directly addresses the audience), but the difference between the reactions of female and male is NOT striking.
Since Reincarnation evokes positive reactions from a broader audience base, the winner of the first round goes to Fiat 500 and Leonardo!
Round Two: Attentional Power
Renault Clio and Fiat 500 both achieved an attentional score of 60.0% in general.
Attentional Power Renault
Attentional Power Fiat
Viewers are highly focused in the first 5 seconds in both ads.
Tips from FEELIN: Strong opening scenes can help you engage your audience form at the beginning of your ad. High attentional score in the opening scene means that people are less likely to disengage from the content and switch from it.
In Renault’s ad, viewers remain constantly engaged throughout the whole video.
Tips from FEELIN: In Renault’s ad, we can identify a brand pulsing strategy. It means to integrate the brand into your ad’s narrative and show the logo more frequently but in a shorter duration. Pulsing strategy proves to be beneficial to keep your audience engaged.
In Fiat’s add, we observe a significant drop as from 00:00:19, it coincides with the ending of Leonardo’s close-up shot, in which he directly speaks to the audience.
Tips from FEELIN: If your ad features a celebrity, he/she will catch most attention. You should avoid creating a “competition” between the endorser and your branding activity. Thoughtful design is needed to eliminate the situation in which attention drops as soon as the endorser disappears from the screen.
Different reactions MALE X FEMALE: Once again, we observe a significant difference (almost 30% in average) between female and male’s attentional score in Renault’s ad. Combining with our analysis from the first round, we can conclude that it’s rather female instead of male who would more identify with the story between mother and son. It’s worth mentioning that both Fiat 500 and Renault Clio have been following the “gender trend” to particularly target female consumers. Then if we only look at the attentional curve of female audience, Renault achieved an average of 78%. So good job Renault!
Tips from FEELIN: Gender matters when your ad is targeting a gender group in particular. It’s crucial to speak the language of your target consumer.
For this round, the winner goes to Renault Clio and its brilliant pulsing strategy!
Round Three: Eye-Tracking Analysis
Region of Interest
As for Round Three, both contestants deliver good performance, the key elements (human character, car model, logo and taglines) are well situated in the area of interest and are fixated by viewers 75% in average.
Tips from FEELIN: With eye-tracking analysis, we locate the region of interest in the video. Making sure that the key elements (logo and tagline for example) are situated in the region of interest is crucial for the brand’s visual remembrance.
Was our analysis useful to you? If you also want to test the effectiveness of you branding, book a demo to see how we can help you make the most of your ads!