🇫🇷 Is this a genius piece of local marketing or a bit of an own goal? Heetch is a ride sharing service that operates in a number of major cities in France. 🚘 One of those cities is going to come to a bit of a standstill this summer. Yes the city of Paris will see millions of tourists arrive in the city in the coming days for the 2024 Olympic Games. And the city is expecting major travel disruption with metros overcrowded, buses delayed, and bike lanes saturated. Getting around Paris will be a challenge/nightmare! So Heetch has decided to step in and support Parisians during this time by.... promoting it's top competitor, Uber, to tourists. Yes read that again, promoting it's top competitor, Uber, to tourists. They have launched a massive integrated campaign, translated into 12 languages, encouraging visitors to "Choose Uber" for their travels in Paris. 🗣 CMO of Heetch Renaud BERTHE is quoted as saying: “ It's an opportunity worth tens of millions of euros for the ride-sharing market. But at Heetch, we've chosen to sit this one out, because serving this population would degrade the quality of service for Parisians, who are an absolute priority for us, even more so in this period when we know that transport is going to be disrupted.” Are they hoping that by doing something this disruptive it will align the Heetch brand to the global giant that is Uber and actually help them grab some of that 10Mil or is it really a longer term bet to win Paris over? As Renaud says “It's rare for a brand to agree to promote its competitor.” - it sure is and there are lots of examples of this back firing massively. As I heard someone say this week "row your own race". Using pretty much every platform imaginable to reach tourists, from airports and hotels to cafes and Olympic venues, even using creative methods like media-tables and baguette wrappers, they are betting big on this one. To be fair the film that goes with it is enjoyable https://lnkd.in/eYmeVngq 🤔 What do you think? Brilliant local marketing with wonderful insight or an own goal that will do more for Uber? #InternationalMarketing #Paris2024 #Heetch #Marketing #LocalMarketing First seen on LBBonline - Little Black Book
Olafemi Adjinda
3mo
I think your article lack the cultural context to understand why it is a great marketing move. They are not promoting Uber as a brand, they are sending a simple message to parisian and thus taking abig stance. They are telling parisian that Heetch will chose them over money and short profit. As a foreigner, I know that french people are really sensitive to patriotic move. From bras to bread and milk french people chose french first, then when a brand tells them directly that french confort comes over profit, it a great marketing and branding stance.
Benjamin Sousa
3mo
🤫
CMO @Heetch
3moIs own goal a goal? 😁